the lost generation and hemingway

3.2.1 The Beat Generation

Much of the work produced by the Lost Generation has been considered significant by literary critics and the American public for quite some time, inspiring generations; this inspiration extended beyond creativity. The Beat Generation mirrors the Lost Generation in a number of ways. Both are groups of

American writers, both object to the American culture of their time, and both groups shared a large sense of wanderlust. The Beat Generation, with all its similar characteristics to the Lost Generation, took on the idea of expatriation for themselves. By this time, the “image [of an expatriate] was often
far from flattering…into the 1960s, ‘expatriate’ was still frequently a pejorative term… those who left the United States during the Vietnam War era as draft evaders or conscientious objectors came in for
their share of opprobrium…and the critical implication of the term was summed up by the frequent misspelling: ‘expatriate,’.[5]

The Beat Generation’s work was certainly influenced by the members of the Lost Generation, namely Gertrude Stein, Ernest Hemingway, and Ezra Pound. Carl Solomon, a writer amongst the Beats, is even described by James Campbell, author of this is the Beat Generation, The Beat Generation, however, was not as fixated on one single place as the Lost Generation was with Paris, though Lost Generation members did make numerous excursions elsewhere. The Beats traveled and experienced. A number of cultures, bringing that influence back to the United States as well as helping influence these various cultures.

The Beat Generation originated in New York City; however, more importantly, the Beat Generation came from a particular time and place—post-war North America. American culture had transformed with the events of early to mid-twentieth century: following World War I, the United States underwent a great economic depression, which was soon followed by World War II. The Beat Generation inherited a world in transition. Throughout the nineteen-forties and fifties, much of American culture still focused upon the nuclear family, upholding religion and American family values. The United States became involved in the Cold War, and mass society did not question the role the United States played within the international sphere. This is the context in which the Beat Generation arose. Jack Kerouac was born in Lowell, Massachusetts to French-Canadian parents, his multicultural heritage predisposing him to a cross-cultural lifestyle, as he related as both a French-Canadian and as an American. As a boy, Kerouac showed promise in the sport of football, landing him a spot on the team at Columbia University. Kerouac’s decision to attend Columbia University is significant, as New York City set the stage for the beginning of his life as a member of the Beats. Kerouac, who ultimately left the university, remained in New York City having united with Allen Ginsberg, Neal Cassady, and William S. Burroughs, among others.
Kerouac would carry a notebook with him everywhere he went, transcribing all of his ideas and observations, writing letters to friends and family. Though he had been a writer throughout his life, it was not until Kerouac’s transcription of his cross-country experience that he considered it as a career. Kerouac’s most notable work, On the Road, chronicles the adventures of Sal (Kerouac) and Dean (Cassady) as they travel across the United States. On the Road is semi-autobiographical, as the characters of Sal and Dean are largely based upon Kerouac and Cassady. Kerouac’s stream of conscious style regularly erupts into spontaneous rifts of prose; this made finding a publisher difficult. Many did not appreciate Kerouac’s experimental style nor his sympathetic tone towards those considered outside of mainstream United States. Kerouac’s novel is very geographic, as he uses the landscape of the United States to process the idea of mobility. [5]
Being disillusioned with American culture and society, many trips abroad, though mostly to Mexico.
Further, Mexico was a convenient location for Kerouac as he could travel there with relative ease and low cost, and had a place to stay: with his friend William S. Burroughs. Burroughs had left the United States for Mexico after being arrested for the possible distribution of marijuana; however, once he left, he found that other countries, like Mexico and Morocco, offered different cultural amenities attractive to Burroughs that the United States did not have. Burroughs’s writing style reflects upon the culture within the United States at the time. During the late 1940s-through the 1950s, the United States exemplified a culture of consumerism and conformity. These were also the early Cold War years, this did not sit well with Burroughs (or the Beat Generation as a whole).

While society feared “the bomb,” Burroughs created a new form of writing to express his sentiments regarding his place in time; he experimented with “cut ups,” combining words and phrases cut out of books, magazines, and newspapers. This style is especially apparent in Naked Lunch. He created collages of sorts, appearing to be nonsense but it made sense; it was “disjointed and strange”. Burroughs’s geography directly translates into his writing. He has referred to himself on multiple occasions as a map maker, a cosmonaut of inner space. Burroughs creates futuristic sites, each of which is heavily influenced by his own experiences in developing regions, such as the Middle East and Latin America. The cacophony of voices, things, costumes of these sleazy dystopian metropolises sometimes seems to originate from the dissolved ego, from the floating timelessness of things induced by hashish… Thus, from Tangier, somehow, seems to start the flow of images that overlap in the futuristic cities of the West, It has been noted by several critics that Burroughs places his prose geographically either in a desert, a jungle, a city, or the United States: The city is not the metropolis of high culture but embodies the gridded spaces ruled by Control society…The desert’s drought enables freedom to flourish, because lack of water renders high density plant and human population—jungle and city—impossible, He uses these varied landscapes, influenced by his personal experiences in Mexico City, Tangiers, and Paris, to produce exoticism and present a less stigmatized version of these exotic places to Western society.

While a Westerner may imagine the desert as arid and lifeless, Burroughs presents it as a mysterious beauty. Of all the Beats, it was Allen Ginsberg who embraced a multicultural lifestyle the most. Ginsberg spent extensive amounts of time all over the world: Latin America (Mexico, Bolivia, Peru), Africa (Morocco, Kenya), Europe (Netherlands, Italy, Spain, France, Greece, Czech Republic) and Asia (India, Vietnam, Japan, Cambodia). India also had a profound effect upon him. Ginsberg, so disillusioned with American culture, went to India in search of connecting with ancient Buddhist culture. Buddha himself was disillusioned, detaching himself from possessions and worldly objects. Ginsburg emulated this lifestyle; he lived thirty-five years in the East Village, shopped at thrift stores, owned one bowl, made people live more humbly. He seemed to live more authentically and truthfully; Ginsberg’s poetry embraced themes and content that directly opposed the image of 1950s American culture. In an interview with Jacquelin Gens, personal secretary to Ginsberg for eight years, she notes that Ginsberg wrote about sexuality (homosexuality and heterosexuality) and mind-altering drugs, challenging the conservative mass-culture at the time; “Howl” challenged the cultural perception of the “other.”

Through his writing, Ginsberg himself influenced various societies, including those living in India and China. India’s economy transformed by Ginsberg, Ginsberg spent six months in China teaching a course on American literature to many of the key intellects at the time, Ginsberg, among the rest of the Beat Generation, led the United States to develop a counter-culture movement that is now historically significant. The expatriates of the Lost Generation created a cultural, literary community specifically in Paris following the end of World War I. Many of the expatriates expressed disappointment, Expatriation was originally viewed as an inclusive concept, outsiders coming to the United States. Though one of the founding principles of the United States was the right to leave, many still adhered to the policy of everlasting allegiance (Yoo).[5]