Perspectives

“HOWL” by Allen Ginsberg is a rather complex and challenging poem, both in terms of form and content. The form is rather heavy, narrative, while also being disorganized. The content makes allusions to specific historical and cultural issues in the 1950s America. For this reason, we recommend you put the poem into perspective.

The literary period

Allen Ginsberg is a key figure in the artistic movement called the Beat Generation, which includes other famous authors like Herbert Huncke, William S. Burroughs, Lucien Carr, and Jack Kerouac. What characterizes this movement is the authors’ rejection of pre-set norms and their active support for the liberation of the individual from limited materialism and spirituality, regardless of the means the individual use (drugs, open sexuality, etc.). A feature of the Beat Generation’s works is ...