Ginsberg's friends in New York insist he travel to the East and explore the subcontinent with them, but he does not need much encouragement. Ginsberg had already heard the ancient voice of William Blake reciting poetry inside his Harlem apartment. He had looked outside the window and noticed how everything was created by a "living hand," how the sky itself was "the living blue hand."
"From that moment, Irwin Allen Ginsberg became a divining rod in the headlong and holy pursuit of God," Baker writes.
She weaves an intricate if somewhat tedious description of Ginsberg's travels through India and his quest for meaning while accompanied by his lover, Peter Orlovsky, and in the company of poets Gary Snyder and Joanne Kyger.
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The Beats in India
Soul of Asia Program
Saturday June 14, 2008
Discover what drew the Beats to India and how they inspired successive generations of Westerners to turn to the East for spiritual and creative wisdom, music, poetry and wild paisley bed spreads. The precursor to a journey that later inspired others such as the Beatles, Philip Glass among others.
Participants include Allen Ginsberg’s fellow travelers and poets Gary Snyder and Joanne Kyger, poets Sunil Gangopadhyay, John Giorno, Anne Waldman, and Ed Sanders, musician Steven Taylor, and authors Pankaj Mishra, Eliot Weinberger, Gita Mehta, and Bill Morgan. Based on Deborah Baker’s book "A Blue Hand: The Beats in India," the program will focus on the Indian journeys of the Beats in the 1960s.
For a full schedule see: http://www.asiasociety.org/events/calendar.pl?rm=detail&eventid=17111
Purchase Tickets:
$20 Members, students w/ID and seniors, $25 Nonmembers
Online: http://tickets.asiasociety.org
By Phone (M-F 10am to 5pm) 212-517-ASIA (2742)
©2008 Asia Society | 725 Park Avenue at 70th Street, NY, NY 10021| 212-288-6400
Supported in part by Harold and Ruth Newman
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