A tiny book about poetry, in the form of poetry (or short one-liners), by a poet. This is a tiny book, but it should not be read quickly in my opinion. Poetry is meant to be taken in and digested slowly rather than plowed through, and this book, a manifesto of what poetry is and is not, should be read in the same way. ( )

I kind of love Ferlinghetti ( )

If any man alive can be still held responsible for the Beat movement and/or the poetry renaissance of the ’50s and ’60s, it is San Francisco poet and City Lights Booksellers & Publishers co-founder Lawrence Ferlinghetti. He was there from the very beginning, helping to create a scene in the Italian North Beach neighborhood that reverberates to this day.

It was the publishing arm of City Lights that propelled East Coast writers such as Allen Ginsburg and Gregory Corso, as well as San Franciscans like Kenneth Rexroth and Ferlinghetti himself, into the national spotlight. The landmark Howl obscenity trial, sparked after San Francisco police seized the City Lights paperback, won more notoriety for what Ginsburg, et al, were up to than any lame spot-the-beatnik tours could have ever brought to bear.

The bibliographical note to this slim volume, Ferlinghetti’s own Ars Poetica, marks it as an on-going work in progress starting as a KPFA broadcast in the late ’50s. The main body of Poetry as Insurgent Art reads almost like a collection of daily affirmations, ranging from practical advice to writers—If you call yourself a poet, don’t just sit there. Poetry is not a sedentary occupation, not a “take your seat” practice. Stand up and let them have it—to more philosophical and sensual musings such as—Be a dark barker before the tents of existence—and—Instead of trying to escape reality, plunge into the flesh of the world.

Some of Ferlinghetti’s aphorisms seem antithetical to a movement that worshiped the idea of Jack Kerouac spontaneously writing On the Road on a continuous roll of teletype paper. Advice like—Cultivate dissidence and critical thinking. First thought may be worst thought—seems to place him outside of the spur-of-the-moment crowd.

Of course, Ferlinghetti always argued that he was never a “Beat,” but was rather a bohemian, sort of a proto-Beat, if you will. In her 2004 book, Bohemian Manifesto: A Field Guide to Living on the Edge, Laren Stover breaks down the evolution of bohemianism into five branches: Nouveau, Gypsy, Beat, Zen, and Dandy, any number and combination of which can still be found slouching around the City wherever hipsters congregate, leading to possibly my favorite of his bits of wisdom—Stash your sell-phone and be here now.

The book veers into more abstract attempts to answer the burning question of What is Poetry? some of which bear the brand of the modern world, such as—Poems are e-mails from the unknown beyond cyberspace. ’Erm, … why do I get the feeling that one may not make the cut in a future edition? Others are timeless—It is private solitude made public—psychedelic—Poetry is Van Gogh’s ear echoing with all the blood of the world—religious—It is the street talk of angels and devils—It is made by dissolving halos in oceans of sound—and political—The idea of poetry as an arm of class war disturbs the sleep of those who do not wish to be disturbed in the pursuit of happiness.

It takes him a while to get around to it, but toward the end of the book lies possibly the best definition of poetry I have ever read—Poetry is making something out of nothing, and it can be about nothing and still mean something. Ferlinghetti certainly knows what he’s talking about, and we’re truly lucky to still have him around. ( )

http://icedteadiaries.blogspot.com/2008/03/poetry-as-insurgent-art-ferlinghetti.... ( )

Kerouac's On the Road supposedly defined the beat generation. It's patron publisher, Lawrence Ferlinghetti was the force behind City Lights, and an impressive poet in his own right. Poetry as Insurgent Art is an attempt to redefine what it means to be a poet. Compiled from material both new and old, this is a rather direct way to address writers.
While much of this ends up being the kind of artistic battle call that made his Generation famous, there are some very valuable insights here for new writers. Obviously this is just for poets, but Ferlinghetti seems to be tidying up the poetry world before his generation checks out all thogether. The Beats played with form and meaning in poetry. They used tropes that went on for pages, and abandoning the metrical foot almost altogether. Ferlinghetti, Corso and Ginsberg are wholly unrelated to Lord Byron, except in title.
Poetry has fallen on hard times, and its place of importance in literature has slowly unraveled in the last four decades. Poets seem to be terminally infected with the avant garde, and performance poetry borders on irrelevance most of the time. Ferlinghetti calls upon poets to make their songs, to challenge everything from everyday perception to accepted poetic devices. There is a sentiment that the urban poets suffer from the same disconnect as their environment.
Ferlinghetti seems to diagnose the problem with poetry easily. On the other hand, his solution is beneath him. Ferlinghetti's best poems deal with extreme subtleties of character, and experience. Poetry doesn't have subtlety. It seems to buy into the myths Ginsberg created with Howl. Mad poets scream into the night, and deride mad leaders with all their goddamn bombs. Poetry needs more than purpose and form, it needs a renewed writers. Writers ready not just to challenge the leaders, but to challenge poetry. It is easy to be a rebel right now, as times seem to call for rebels. Poetry needs to be ahead what is expected, and I'm not saying rebellion by conforming. That is for painters and playwrights. No poetry must examine closely the rebels, as closely as the leaders. Ferlinghetti has a cadence to arms, but no battle plan. I expect better for someone who qualifies as a living Poet Zen Master. ( )