



S1: as you will see while m- gay culture is, while male gay culture is friendly toward women queer culture tended to be, outright hostile, toward women why? because, uh they tended to think of uh women as rivals for men's affections and attention and uh, and just basically got in the way Burroughs even w- in his, way even went so far as to talk about woman as an evolutionary mistake. this is the same guy who talks about, the human, virus... y- you may r- just to go back and think a little bit about Howl, you may remember some of Ginsberg's comments, uh, you know where like in this passage the Three Old Shrews of Fate where he, uh, sort of stereotypes uh women as uh, kind of like the old hag, um, and he talks about the heterosexual dollar as if there's a, uh as if heterosexuality is some kind of a a basic plot, um... and um, a- and lastly of course the very familiar idea, i- uh which i talked about when we talked about Ginsberg who copulated ecstatic and insatiate, with a bottle of beer a sweetheart, uh package of cigarettes and a candle. as though the woman on the scene was just, uh, one more little item, like you got your beer you got your cigarettes, you got your woman so uh, in other words a f- the w- the woman as kind of an ornament or f- or uh, an ornament to the, to the male kind of like the the best dress- the well-dressed man, has to be wearing a nice looking suit and he has to have a nice looking, woman, on his arm, uh, i leave it up to you to decide, how prevalent these attitudes still are, but you can see how, basically blatant they were, back in the nineteen fifties. uh Gary Snyder whom we're going to talk about in the second hour, today, even you know Snyder, the thing that makes Snyder, the thing that makes Snyder's, ideas unique is that he, went back to, uh what what are called primitive cultures and, at at the same time that he brought back some very useful, and uh challenging ideas from examining the thought of primitive, uh cultures from his study of anthropology for example you can see that in some cases, he brought with him, quite a few stereotypes about women, and, i por- perhaps most, uh again i'll use the word blatant is the w- is the poem called Praise For Sick Women on page two-ninety-one, uh, Snyder has not only lived to, uh regret uh this poem but (is) also, someone who really has very progressive views on the subject of, gender now he's he is somebody, h- who has constantly learned, and, uh changed with the times as he's gotten older, but he did write this poem, on Beat Reader page two-ninety-one the female is fertile, in discipline, contra naturam which means against nature, uh the idea that discipline is somehow against nature, and that discipline only, confuses her. the poem basically, c- carries that uh, you know that old-fashioned, reactionary idea that, the primary purpose for women in life is to, um, bear children and that's what this poem, is all about. uh Diane Di Prima, another San Francisco poet, uh took him to task on the subject, and you'll find her poem on page three sixty-one. i- actually if you want to, uh think about women writers in the Beat Generation i w- i would definitely uh recommend, uh Diane Di Prima, um... she uh, in her poem The Practice of Magical Evocation, she quotes on page three sixty-one she quotes Gary Snyder, the female is fertile in discipline only confuses her, and she comes back very uh, very tongue in cheek and very, sarcastic by, by um, you know kind of uh repeating these ideas, in her own voice, uh, with a straight face and very ironically i am a woman and my poems are woman's easy to say this, the female is ductile ductile means, pliable, easily led, um, and stroke after stroke built for masochistic, calm. so she just uh, uh, she talks about pelvic architecture functional, the context wide and relatively sloppy bring forth men children, only. so it's good to know that uh, uh, she was k- she was ready to take him to task, on that subject that'd be kind of an interesting thing for you to, study if you're talking about gender, relations and gender ideas in the Beat Generation would be to contrast, that poem by Gary Snyder with that poem, uh, by Diane Di Prima. so, there's a book called the San Francisco Renaissance by, uh Michael Davidson and i'm quoting him here the Beat ethos, relegated women to the role of sexual surrogate muse or mom. uh, uh so somebody to have sex with, um, uh somebody to inspire, uh men to do their own, artistic work or, mom. obviously this is, uh very familiar to you from reading, On the Road. uh, the_ his aunt of cour- as you as you know is f- in the book is really his, mother and, i don't think it's at all unfair to talk about the, Beat Generation as being, a kind of boys' club. as Davidson talks about in here. i- it_ you remember the part where uh in Dharma Bums where Kerouac is talking about, uh, princess and he he says you know well she, she wanted to be a, a big grown up uh Buddha herself but uh since she was just a girl, the only way she could get in on the spiritual, scene was, um, through sex. well, y- h- you know i- it would be n- it would be nice to think and i do think that that we have uh we've progressed quite a lot on on this particular subject some people, feel as if we still have a, long way to go but it's really interesting to go back in time forty years or something and see, some of these uh gender stereotypes in their really, raw, blatant form and one reason that you see them in their raw and blatant form in the nineteen fifties, is that, th- they hadn't reached_ society hadn't reached a place, where people felt that uh, there was any reason to apologize for, these ideas so you can_ gender stereotyping in its uh purest and and really most s- uh d- dispiriting and and kind of saddest form, the fifties, are a very good time to study, those attitudes. historically, women have tended to be the subjects of works of art, rather than the creators of art. the the female nude is a, a staple of, of art. this is a painting by Willem de Kooning he's another, abstract expressionist painter of the, uh action painting school. and, you can see this beautiful, painting of his called Woman. we're gonna listen to another, poet of <SOUND CLIP SET OFF EARLY> uh i- i'm sorry. uh, i just wanted to bring the volume down a little bit on this. maybe that'll help. um, David Melcher is another poet of the, San Francisco School, and here's his poem called Wife. i don't think this poem is intended in an unkindly way at all in fact it's, it's very fond and, uh, and k- kind bu- the the interesting thing about listening to it is, is how condescending, it is. he's in one room writing, his wife is in another room, and he seems uh, more or less possessed with anxiety tha- that h- his wife in watering the (xx) <SOUND CLIP BEGINS> the sound quality is just poor so, uh it's another really good example from, of of somebody who, uh who uh, who writes a poem that, certainly has love in it and and as i say not intended unkindly just the interesting thing about it is how, how incredibly condescending it is and how, unconscious, the writer, David Meltzer seems to, be of his own, attitudes. i want to show you some things by four, women painters. these are people who were part of the, New York School. you know the n- when you're talking about art, uh the visual but we're talking about painting, the New York School, is more or less synonymous with what we've been talking about abstract expressionism, and more or less syn- in abstract expressionism is more or less synonymous with what is called action painting. uh remember when we were talking about Frank O'Hara, Frank O'Hara was a, uh literary, link between the painters and the writers. h- he was uh, an assistant curator at the Museum of Modern Art absolutely terrific poet you m- may remember his, poem uh The Day Lady Died that we, listened to in this class. um... these people were, part of that group of painters uh we're talking Helen Frankenthaller Grace Hartigan. Grace Hartigan, did a lot of collaborations in frac- in fact with Frank O'Hara. some of her paintings she painted, the words of O'Hara's poems into her, paintings uh and then the other two painters i want to, show you some things are Lee Krasner and Joan Mitchell. so, these are a- these are abstract paintings obviously. um, reproduction is not too bad... so what is it about painting i mean just, uh, i don't know if you, i don't know if you, make a habit of going to art museums but one of the hardest things, is really just to look at something. and, y- you know just look at something and and uh, uh, take it all in through your eyes uh... one of the things that happens when you look at an abstract painting, you're always kinda tempted to uh, you know think about uh, well if it weren't an abstraction, i mean what what does, pictorially what does it kind of resemble, in um, in the representational world? but, i have an artist friend who says that the, uh, the average painting_ that most paintings get looked at, for an average of three seconds. i i don't know if you've seen people walk around in an art mu- art museum just kinda, going from one picture to another but i mean, it's awfully sad to think that, that uh, that we don't, know how to look at things very well. i just want to encourage you, right as you're sitting, here today just to look at these paintings. um, this is another, by Helen Frankenthaller... <P :12> when i was talking to you about, abstraction in painting, one of the things that i mentioned was that, uh, i don't know if you've ever had this uh this kind of stereotype about abstract art yourself, uh, i- u- i was kind of introduced to it with the idea that, an abstract painting, didn't bear any relation to the, normal, wor- i mean, you know that there was no resemblance between abstract art and representational art, it's not like that. let me just kind of refresh your memory about the word abstract. i think it's best understood if, if you look at it from the standpoint that it, looks at the world, representationally that is as a r- uh, seeing what a person would see by looking at the world, and then it abstracts, certain, features from that not giving you the, kind of, total photographic picture but giving you some, version, and so what would you think of in this painting it looks, doesn't it look a little bit like a landscape? i mean uh, uh i think that's how i- that's, that's kind of what it is isn't it? i mean isn't this sort of a, sort of a river the banks of a river, this is the sky the sun rising r- i mean there's certainly a way of looking, at the paint- painting you can just look at it, if you uh choose to as as just pure design, because obviously, there are elements of pure design because w- i- i- if we're thinking about this this is a river or a lake and these are the banks and, there's some hills in the background there's the sun, rising or setting or something like that, then you say well what is this uh you'd say well it's a tree but if it's a tree why is it, that color? why isn't it th- tree color uh b- uh so, i think when when we look at art like this we go back and forth between, seeing it representationally and and seeing it, just, pure, uh... so that's, here's another uh Frankenthaller painting,<P :08> one of the things you do when you look at art is to just try to, appreciate it, as uh, paintings as as pure design. it's a very good way of looking at paintings <P :05> you look at this one right here and you might this part right here and you s- i don't know, it looks like a teddy bear with ears doesn't it? you know? uh, what would that, why would that be in the painting uh, uh, it's funny i look at it and i sort of see like a ship in there and uh, water here, uh, but then let's talk about the, pure design elements of it like, uh bang bang bang those three areas of brown that forms a kind of that forms a pattern, uh, the way the blue here the blue here and the blue down here the way they all speak to each other how those are balanced, uh typically, a painter at work will talk about_ will look at a canvas and talk about well it needs something, just_ or what does it need just like when you're cooking, you you taste your_ the soup that you're making and you s- you say to yourself uh, uh... it needs something. and then y- there's somebody in the kitchen with you, and you t- you get them to taste it and you say, what does it need? and then they'll tell you um, salt or something like that. uh here's Grace Hartigan. this painting is called Moths.<P :04> i mean isn't this a gorgeous thing?<P :06> i'm really kinda pleased how well these, show up i mean, computer uh, digitized art, always loses something, but this gives you a pretty good notion of what this painting actually looks like... since she called it_ th- the interaction between, language and the visual arts is always a very, interesting interaction uh, she calls it Moths and so you when you look at you see moth, shapes in it. you could you could equally well see it as, as design uh and if you_ i mean all these things that i'm talking about i think are things that are happening in our minds, as we look at painting. i- it's just i'm, sort of trying to articulate 'em and so you're thinking about the relationship between these, dark_ these sort of blackish blackish brown, areas. how these all relate to each other visually. how these browns, or chocolatey browns relate to each other, and then how these, kind of ochre yellows, kind of have sort of a descending swing, down this way.<P :13> but do y- you know what i mean about looking at things i mean... i- i guess it's a, it's a very common fault to, look but not see or just not to, look at things but, it's a wonderful thing about looking at, paintings is just you, you have your eyes open and, and you, this, like Ginsberg says seeking jazz or sex or soup. you could s- add art to that. th- i- just, painting like this just sort of, comes right at ra- right out at you and sort of, moves right through your eyes into you brain i i think you can feel that happening when you, look at a painting like Grace Hartigan's, Moths.<P :08> so a- about a painting like you know they talk about two kinds of painting, abstract and, figurative figurative meaning, that it's about something you know in the in the sort of layman's approach to art well it's a picture of a barn or something like that. abstract meaning, (what) the things that i've just talked about more or less. uh pure design, uh, this is obviously kind of a blend between, the abstract and the figurative. gosh what a nice painting. and one of the things that, that i don't know if you've ever had any art history or anything but one of the things about, um, one of the characteristics of of uh modern art, is to approach the, canvas as a uh, one-dimensional, area. it's just, a rectangle of, stuff. a rectangle of visual stuff do you see i mean there's no perspective in this there's no, there's no foreground and there's no background it's all, it's all coming straight at you, on this flat plane tha- that's if you like i a- as i said before if you, don't have any, if you haven't looked at pictures if you don't have a, an art background or never taken an art history class that's one thing, to appreciate it's just all, one-dimensional it's all coming at you that way visually you're not, th- there's nothing like in traditional art of, starting with the foreground and m- moving by perspective back into the, background uh with the like warm colors in the front of the painting, and the cool colors, in the back of the painting that's something that uh, modern artists tend to be interested in filling up a, a flat rectangle of space rather than creating an illusion of uh, pictorial depth. Lee Krasner, who had the fortune or, misfortune of being, Jackson Pollock's wife, this is a painting by her City, Vertical. uh, obviously again by giving it the title she gave it you're, we're meant to, think of it not as pure, abstraction we're we're meant to think of it, as having a relation to the, uh to cityscape, to, skyscrapers and uh, uh... i think i- i- if you if you looked at the painting not knowing what it's title was, well obviously you would be ex- you would be aware of the verticality of all, cuz it's primarily vertical and then, then the, uh the changes that happen, within the verticality like a wider, shape that's kind of bent something that doesn't quite go with the verticals this one that sorta, swerves over from one line to the other. and then the play of colors. uh, the the warm yellow next to the cool blue you know what i mean by warm and cool warm comes towards you cool, recedes from you so tr- in traditional painting, you would have the warm, colors the haystack or the cottage or something, i- i- in the front of the painting and that would tend to be down here, because the foreground uh, what's closer to you i- usually is, pictured down here in a painting, and then the, cool colors that are receding things would tend to, go back and they would tend to sorta go back in a triangle, like this because that's the way our eyes see something that's in the, that's close to us receding to something far back. this painting doesn't, uh doesn't have an ambition to do something like that but still it's interesting to see, the way she put the cool color and the warm color, next to each other. the blue and the yellow. <P :07> here's another Lee Krasner this is a photograph of a, of a big painting so kind of from the side this is called Crescent.<P :04> and you can see that she's, very much concerned with pure design with the, with the square w- basically a kind of a grid laid out by squares, um, intercepted by the uh, you have, basically two, two design elements that are, working with each other here the sq- the grid, created by the squares, and then the, the big curves that work against the grid or complement the grid. see these two, elements, going against each other that's another one as i say by L- Lee Krasner. uh now uh let's look at a few paintings by, Joan Mitchell you know one of the hardest things in the world, is to, uh talk or write about art because, i- in a way w- why you know in a way why do it just just look at it just like music why why talk about music just uh, just listen to it but um, um John Ashbery is a, uh, one of the most celebrated contemporary poets, when he was younger, John Ashbery made his living, by writing art criticism and i vastly prefer his art criticism to his poetry. uh, because it's so clear. uh and, and just look how he, you know he doesn't use any, kind of technical vocabulary to talk about this painting this is, one of the things that Joan Mitchell did which w- a- one_ a choice that Joan Mitchell made which was an interesting choice, New York was the capital of the art world, uh, traditionally through the nineteenth century and and all the way up, through the nineteen twenties and thirties the center of the art world was Paris. a- as we know, as you know from what you've heard about abstract expressionism the New York school, when a lot of artists fled Europe in the nineteen forties and moved to New York, New York became the capital, of the art world and it spawned its own movement that movement called abstract expressionism. so Joan Mitchell made an in- being, an American made an, very interesting choice when she moved to Paris, uh uh oddly, uh by moving to Paris she moved from the center, of, civilization n- uh, i- in in artistic terms to what was kind of a backwater sort of a sleepy backwater in the art world, and, uh, m- many people have said that uh, the, the kind of rejection of ambition represented by that move to Paris, is reflected in her paintings because they're, they're more, th- they're not, y- you a- you're obviously talking about an artist here who, who is not, setting out to make it real big in the art world she's somebody who's just, uh, exploring her own view it's interesting what Ashbery says, <READING> it looks strong and relaxed classical and refreshing at the same time it has both the time and the will, to be itself. her p- new paintings continue an unhurried meditation, an unhurried meditation, on bits of landscape and air </READING> that that's a very interesting, uh, remark. uh, an unharri- an unhurried meditation on landscape and air, uh h- how does air represent itself visually i mean isn't air, completely clear? you know i mean can you see, air well i guess from a painter's standpoint, the answer to that question is no, because air does have a certain kind of a, a, visibility to it um, painters are often painting, not the objects, but the light, and that's what Ashbery's talking about when he's talking about, meditation not, on some landscape, but on the air as well the light, that is between the painter and the thing that she is painting. and th- or the light that surrounds those, objects here's a, kind of a triptych, by Joan Mitchell <P :07> you know some people don't l- just don't like painting like this at all. and uh, fine. uh, s- seriously. uh i don't care uh, but uh, you know, uh... that's n- not my business. i really don't care. but, if you wanna try to gain an appreciation of painting like this well, you've got three rectangles they're all, side by side and then you've got, these, she's put these, masses within that within those three rectangles and, so just think about it in terms of design. here's this little rectangle, here's this other one over here, th- this is what your eye does when your eye is looking when you're looking at this, this is the activity that's happening with your eye, when you're looking at it and maybe you're just not thinking, about it all okay the o- she creat- the overall background is with the paint, the the kind of whitish off-white paint which is, all around the, in h- which covers the entire surface and then, what does how does this bounce off that and how does that bounce off that and then what's the relationship, visually between that and that? now you might not be_ and then what's this in here, kind of a balance, this more neutral area is a balance between this, and this now, you may not even be thinking about that a- at all but your eye is_ your brain is thinking about this something your eye, is m- th- something's happening there between your, your eye and your brain you're you're i- you're registering if you're looking at it you're registering it, whether you have the uh, uh, whether you can verbalize it or not that's another pai- another painting by Joan Mitchell and here's, here's one just called Weeds. uh the uh last painting that we looked at, is uh, tremendously cool. this painting is tremendously warm and i- uh, uh, why is it warm? it's warm because, uh, because it's got a lot of warm colors in it, it's becau- alright blue, uh, pure blue is a coo- is a a, cool color in other words a color that recedes from the eye. this isn't a pure blue that she uses see she's using a kind of a purple. she's mix- mixing uh, a warm color red with a cool color blue, and that_ she gets this purple and that's why, it's warmer, than it would be if it were a cool, kind of a sky blue for example. okay so that's_ i'm just talking about color values. um, gee these colors this these sort of uh, uh, burnt ochres, uh, brownish y- orangey, kind of colors, they're hot. they're very warm so, so they stand out they come forward toward us a little bit they stand out a little bit from the, from the relatively, cool, bluish purples uh, i think it's quite a reasonable thing for somebody to say well what's this painting all about well, weeds <LAUGH> she calls it Weeds and so you can think okay it's a picture of weeds it's a painting of weeds she, set her easel up and painted some weeds uh, on the other hand you can just ignore that title and and, think of it, as pure design this is, uh this is the, that kind of double way of looking at something that you're almost always, that you almost always find yourself in, when you are are are looking about art. so um, so these are several w- women artists, Lee Krasner Joan Mitchell Helen Frankenthaller Grace Hartigan, um, here is another notable we already talked about Billie Holliday here's, well here's actually i'm a little bit ahead of, myself this means field in French, so here's another Joan, Mitchell, uh i mean, i- i'm kind of giving you some ideas, about it but, God isn't it beautiful uh um, it sure is beautiful on my screen. um, just those vibrant blues and then the little, the, you know the, the dark bra- background, of the blacks and then this little dance of these hot, kind of, brown browny oranges. uh, i'd like for you to listen to, we listened to Billie Holiday, i'd like for you to listen to another, female singer of, of the era. Sarah Vaughn... and maybe we can convince, Sarah Vaughn to uh, sing something for us here.<P :10> i was uh l- driving in the car yesterday listening to uh, Ella Fitzgerald sing Sunday Kind of Love, and my son who was in the car with me said, said yeah isn't it interesting s- uh Ella Fitzgerald sings, i Want a Sunday Kind of Love and Billie Holiday sings Gloomy Sunday. i- i- really if you know those two singers it really sums up the difference between, uh, the bluesy, despairing, uh pain. <START AUDIO CLIP> here's Sarah Vaughn. this is more of a, song with more of a blues, feeling to it, uh Ain't No Use.
S1: so you can uh play this song for that, special someone.
<SS LAUGH> 
S1: that special, rat... that adorable cockroach... <END SOUND CLIP> and go away <SS LAUGH> um, we listened to the k- uh, comic Lord Buckley, somebody with a, a less kind reality, is the person we're going to listen to now Lenny Bruce, uh i don't know how many of you hang out with musicians jazz musicians are uh notoriously, uh inarticulate, uh people who are really good at music often tend not to be very good, with words. so this is a, uh, the the skit here is a an uncomprehending, uh journalist is interviewing, a jazz musician named Shorty Petterstein. <P :05> i think you will, dig it. i blow french horn... Shorty Petterstein. um, i'm going to uh take a break here and ask you to fill out the uh c-... course evaluation forms. um, could you take ten minutes on these <STUDENT HANDS SOMETHING TO PROF> thank you, could you take ten minutes on these please? and here are the, uh, the, golf pencils. that's their technical, name. and just please take a form and pass it around, <HANDING EVAL FORMS TO STUDENT> there you go. oh (let's see let's see) okay here's, here's the golf pencils... so let's take ten minutes on this and and we will um, we will go and do uh, we'll talk, uh more about Gary Snyder. you wanna listen to a little music while you're filling out the forms? will that get in the, way? <P :15> oh and is Mary Jones here?
S2: yeah
S1: <HANDS SOMETHING TO STUDENT> thanks Mary
S2: you're welcome
<P :07> 
S1: oh uh is anyone going over to_ in the direction of Angell Hall? <STUDENT RESPONDS> okay would you mind passing y- when you get your evaluations done would you mind passing 'em down to Keisha? she's going to she_ and could you just take 'em up to the main uh, you know where the m- English office is? yeah just give 'em to them at the desk please and, put 'em in this, big envelope. throw out the bad ones you know <S2 LAUGH>
<P :26> <SOUND CLIP BEGINS> 
S1: i uh, i'll be right back. yeah i can (xx) those or- of you who are jazz fans, isn't it incredible what Herbie Hancock is playing on piano on this? you know you probably know like Headhunter and uh, Watermelon Man and, those things that, uh, when uh, l- later in the sixties when Herbie Hancock and in in in the early seventies when Herbie Hancock was doing the kind of funk, uh, stuff that, made him rich um, like Watermelon Man and and and that album Headhunter. amazing how lyrical and beautiful, a- beautifully he's playing on this.<P :05> this is the uh, this is Miles Davis, you know uh Miles Davis went uh, into that kind of jazz called fusion, and uh this is right at the period_ this is the last album that he made uh, before he went into that period. i think it's the most, 
S3: (your) mic's not on
S1: oh my w- my mic's not on thank you. um, this is the um, this is the last album that Miles made, just before he went into the uh, uh electric kind of fusion period i think is the album that pr- uh precedes Bitches Brew. so it's kind of the last of the old Miles. it's a really really beautiful, beautiful album. an incredible uh Tony Williams on drums <P :06> it's called Miles Smiles pick it up. <SOUND CLIP ENDS><P :04> okay... ss- stop... alright now we're going to go back and talk more about Gary Snyder, uh Dharma Bums, and so forth er- Earth Household... could i get you to give them all these pencils, please, thank you very much. <P :15> so those of you who are in the very very select group, and you know who you are, and if you don't know what i'm talking about then you don't need to, even listen to what i'm saying, but those few of you who are in that very very select little group, don't forget, one o'clock, today, okay? and here's the man, that you're going to connect with and you know all about that, and i just wanna make sure that you know how to get in touch with John, on email because questions, you know uh remember that i'm giving out the take-home exam on Thursday and you're taking that home and, doing it over the weekend, and turning it back in, on Monday, uh, th- this is how you can get in touch with, John on email. so more about Gary Snyder, uh, isn't it interesting how people look i mean it, you know i- isn't it interesting that uh, this is how Kerouac describes him. he wore a s- little goatee strangely oriental, looking with his somewhat slanted green eyes i mean isn't it interesting how, people, uh, i mean, i- you know since Gary Snyder was going to turn out to be someone who had a great interest in, uh, uh in uh Japanese, ch- Chinese literature Asian philosophy, uh, since he was interested in in those cultures isn't it interesting that that there was a little bit of something in his appearance that, would kind of remind you, of the of those cultures i mean, y- you know it's it's an odd thing i don't know if you believe in reincarnation or not. um, i just uh came up with a little information sheet for you about Gary Snyder's poetry. with uh most of this is b- being covered, in in our classes on Gary Snyder but this these might be, interesting to you and, and please give me, back the extras. <P :05> it was the wiry suntanned vigorous, open, quality of Gary Snyder that really appealed, uh to Jack Kerouac i hope that information sh- you'll find that information sheet, useful um... now, the there's an uh every uh, you know every generation every uh, uh, artistic movement every social movement has, kinda certain defining events i might think about for the uh, uh, anti-war uh political movement of the nineteen sixties it would be the nineteen sixty-eight democratic convention, in Chicago for the introduction of modern art in America it would be the Armory show, in New York City. uh, for the hippies it would be Woodstock, for the beat poets the defining event, was something called Six Poets at the Six Gallery. uh, Kerouac, i- uh describes this, in Dharma Bums, and he's talking about these, poets who, all get together i'm looking at page eleven, Dharma Bums the other poets, he's talking about how, he, liked Snyder, better than he liked these other guys because as you know, uh Kerouac didn't, have much use for people that he described as arty types or intellectuals, or uh, or Bohemians he de- defines Bohemians on p- a Bohemian on page ten, as a hanger-on-er, around the arts. did y- did you ever uh stop and wonder where the word Bohemian, comes from? uh well Bohemia, was a province of what used to be Czechoslovakia, and when they were going through their political troubles in the mid nineteenth century, a lot of th- Bohemians, people from Bohemia moved to Paris, and they, were kind of an artistic group and other people hung, other people interested in the arts hung with them, so they, ca- became known as the, Bohemians, and that's why we call them that to this day uh, and in the nineteenth century there started to be, uh really for the first time, uh an opposition between, what? between the avant-garde, the underground, uh, people who were hip, uh as opposed to the establishment, people who were straight, uh, mainstream, values of all kinds in the arts and elsewhere, and it's it's it's it's interesting that uh, that distinction between the in-group and the straight-group, has continued and we s- continue to use, the word Bohemian. um, Ray Smith describes the other poets on page eleven the other poets who were participating in this event called the Six Poets at the Six Gallery the other poets were, were either h- horn-rimmed intellectual hepcats with wild black hair like Alva Goldbrook, or delicate pale handsome poets like O'Shea, or out of this world genteel looking renaissance Italians like Francis, Di Pavia, now we're not really studying the San Francisco Renaissance poets but if we were, you would uh, learn that Francis Di Pavia is a, surrealist writer named Philip Lamantia, and um, uh, bo- bar- bow-tied wer- wild-haired old anarchist fuds like, r- Rheinhold, Cacoethus. now Cacoethus, his, he represents, uh a real life character named Kenneth Rexroth. Kenneth Rexroth, <BEGIN SOUND CLIP> this is, Kenneth Rexroth reading one of his poems. over music. <P :06> this is called They are Killing the Young Men. ... interesting isn't this horrible...? i mean isn't it pompous, and... (xx) portentous <P :19> you gotta have the bowed cello right? <P :46> and that's Allen Ginsberg as a young man, as you can, recognize. <END SOUND CLIP><P :06> i just wanted you to hear that kind of as an example of uh how bad it can get. uh, uh, but the funny thing is that Rexroth, was really quite an expert on jazz i mean i- Rexroth understood, stuff about jazz he's a great writer on jazz uh, uh i mean i- his his uh insight, that in modern jazz ornamentation replaced melody, it- it's a kind of a simple idea but once you, cop to that idea then you really understand something about modern jazz im- i mean i'm thinking about, um, when uh, uh Charlie Parker will be playing a tune and he'll get, kind of interested in one_ in a little embellishment and then he'll sort of leave the tune behind and just, start r- running variations on that particular, embellishment it's an important thing to understand about jazz, Rexroth was in many ways a very admirable character i mean he started off as a labor, organizer in San Francisco it's one of the_ San Francisco is one of the early, kind of uh l- labor hotbeds because the longshoremen there were were organized in, to unions uh Rexroth was a uh, an anarchist um, he he di- he did beautiful translations from Japanese and Chinese, um, his hundr- One Hundred Poems from Chinese is really a terrific little book and, and One Hundred Poems from Japanese they're r- they're really worth reading but they're must've been something about Rexroth you can tell from the name, Cacoethus, that Kerouac gives to him it's not very complimentary there was something about, uh Rexroth that, that must've been, slightly unpleasant anyway he's a, w- as you study, literary history you're you're you ought_ they're they're they're figures, they're the kind of figures that, get uh remembered like uh Kerouac Burroughs Ginsberg and then there're people that, not too many people know about like Kenneth Rexroth or Philip Whalen they're they're sort off, to the side they're f- uh, Kenneth Rexroth was the emcee, at this reading called Six Poets at the Six, Gallery where uh Howl was read for the first time, and a lot of the poems by Gary Snyder that we're studying, were read by the first ti- were read for the first time and and one of the really interesting things about reading Dharma Bums, side by side, with uh Gary Snyder's poetry, is that you can, you can s- the- there was Jack Kerouac i- you know j- Jack Kerouac, uh, going out buying big jugs of of wine and bringing 'em back in and passing them around, and encouraging the poets when they read by, i- uh you know standing in the back of the room yelling go go go, uh at the same time he was obviously taking notes on the readings so, his, accounts of the reading_ it's very interesting to compare them, to the, actual poems so for example, in uh Dharma Bums, on page fourteen when he's describing this, event which turned out to be a, historic event, he talks about, uh Jaffee, reading and his anarchistic ideas about how Americans don't know how to live with lines about commuters being trapped in, living rooms that come from poor fell- from poor trees felled by chainsaws showing here also, his background as a logger up north, well all you have to do is turn to, The Back Country, page four, <READING> the chainsaw falls for boards of pine suburban bedrooms block on block will waver, with this grain and knot. the maddening shapes will start and fade each morning when computers wake join boards hung on, frames a box to catch the biped in </READING> that's a passage that, i talked about last time but, uh, what's the difference between, uh, the w- uh the way the poem is in Snyder's lines and and the po- the way the poem is, in Kerouac's view of it. really i'd say the word poor, because if if anything, um, i- if there's one thing you can say for certain about Snyder it's that he was not sentimental. he would never talk about the poor trees, felled by chainsaws. Kerouac did have a, sentimental streak and that's, just that you can see that one word, that's the difference, uh says a lot about the difference in sensibility, between these two, characters because uh, Snyder doesn't moralize, that's one of the h- he has kind of a cold, objectivity. uh also you may remember the class that we did on Buddhism? um, so, uh, Ray Smith, says he's sitting i- you know outside the little cottage, that he shares in Berkeley with Alva Goldbrook I-E Allen Ginsberg, <READING> old rotten porch slanted forward to the ground among vines with a nice old rocking chair that i sat in every morning and read my Diamond Sutra, </READING> so it's kind of interesting to look to the Buddhist uh scriptures themselves, and see what, the Buddha, was s- was saying um, the tatha, gata, Sanskrit's a really interesting language i recommend it, to you, um, gata means to go i think i was telling you or i mean i- that's the root i was telling you about that uh, uh, that, sutra, that g- that goes uh gate gate para gate para sam gate, uh in other words gone, completely gone thoroughly gone that's the same, that uh, G-A-T, that root right there is the same as the, r- for the English word go, and what tatha means, thusly, and so i- okay here's the name, for the centr- here's the Sanskrit name for the central, figure in this religion, okay? Let me j- you see what i'm talking about, it's like they would uh, like you'd say, the Lord or uh, uh the Messiah the, Son of Man the different names, that we have for religious figures, what do they call the_ uh in Sanskrit what do they call the Buddha tathagata it leans(sic) literally the one who goes, like that. it's <LAUGH> really an interesting term see because, it's an interestingly kind of, neutral term the one who goes like that i mean what does, what does that mean i- i- y- you it's something that you really, couldn't understand, without, having a- a- an intuitive, inner understanding, of the tradition itself of the Buddhist tradition, itself. but this is sh- uh w- something, think back to the class that we did on Buddhism, the dharma or law universal law which, the Buddha, has fully known or demonstrated, i- this is what it says in the in the Diamond Sutra <READING> it cannot be grasped it cannot be talked about, it is neither a dharma, or uh, nor a non-dharma </READING> uh e- this this uh, sutra has that typically, elusive quality, of uh of so many things in Buddhism sort of like uh, uh a- a- and remember what i was talking about about Taoism how how how much Zen Buddhism derives, from Taoism? kind of like if you have to a- it's sort of like they say how much does, it cost to buy and maintain a yacht if you have to ask you can't afford it. it's the same thing i- in in Buddhism if you, or Taoism if you uh, if you don't get it there's basically no point in asking about it it's just kind of a particular knack and what's what they're talking about in in, Taoism when they say, uh, the way that cu- that that can be grasped, is not the true way. um, the highest truth is like water it flows e- everywhere but uh, uh, it it it doesn't have a kind of a, a substance to it a verifiable, you can't go out and buy yourself, a, a half ounce of the Tao it's not a substance you know it's something that's, y- you can't explain it and uh uh that's i guess that's the thing that makes Buddhism particularly Zen Buddhism, so uh fascinating and at the same time so frustrating, for a lot of people and i- and you know from reading this book, that um, Ray Smith the Jack Kerouac character is intensely frustrated by the idea of Zen he's much more comfortable with the, old-fashioned or Hinayana kind of Buddhism that he has learned out of books. why? because it's all kind of laid out, and then secondly because it's much closer to Catholicism, that he grew up with so he can, understand it better so uh, when you when he talks about reading, the Diamond Sutra that's the kind of thing, that he's reading the the r- fascinating thing about, Gary Snyder for me this is taken from The Back Country page five, is that, i- being in- as intensely interested in, the spiritual life as he is, he also, equally loves the, the world of Samsara you r- may remember that Samsara means the wheel, of birth, death and rebirth. and i- he's talking about a pregnant woman, <READING> belly stretched taut in a bulge breasts swelling as you guzzle beer, who wants Nirvana? </READING> you know i- this is so, this is so uh, uh kind of well we used to say essency. you know it's just so, kind of earthy and real and and of the essence of, of life. uh i mean what what could be more uh, representative of the, just, pure full-out, thusness thisness itness of life than a pregnant woman drinking a bottle of beer? <READING> here is water wine beer enough books for a week </READING> so that's the thing y- you're talking about um, uh, that this, interestingly balanced and integrated personality of Gary Snyder somebody who's very spiritually, inclined but also someone, who loves the things, of this world very much now uh, <ADDRESSING MICASE RESEARCHER> d- i hope you're not gonna be fu- pu- feel put on the spot but, could you just, give us a little announcement
R1: yeah um i'm gonna give you the short version we have a little thing that we normally read but um this class is being recorded and if anybody, has any objections or any questions about the project that i'm working on, feel free to ask me about it after class. does anybody object? okay good, thanks.
S1: okay your welcome. i mean, no i don't see why anyone anyone would object, um, um one of my real favorite poems, by Snyder is this one called, h- it- it's called How to Make Stew in the Pinacoti, Desert it's on page twenty-eight, in The Back Country. i mean isn't this great it's just a how-to poem how how to make stew, but um, but it's not just your recipe in the process of being_ telling you how to make stew, it tells you, it just tells you so much it suggests so much about how, enjoyable, life is you know and and and it tells you so much about the way of life he's, leading we don- we have no idea who Locke and Drum are we figure they're friends of his who asked him, to give them a recipe for stew. <READING> How to Make Stew in the Pinacoti Desert Recipe for Locke and Drum. H-A bayless market bent wire roller basket buy up parsnips </READING> so there you are in the supermarket right? <READING> buy up parsnips onion carrot rutabaga potato bell green pepper and nine cuts of dark beef shank, they run there on their legs that makes the meat tasty, </READING> what's he talking about? he's talking about free-range beef. <READING> seven at night in Tucson get some Bisquik for the dumplings have some bacon. </READING> you know it's like, you don't, go out and buy it you've already got it it's in the fridge somewhere. <READING> go to Hadley's in the kitchen right beside the frying state Diana on the phone </READING> see it's a whole picture, of the lives, that Snyder and his friends, are leading uh, <READING> Diana on the phone get a little plastic bag from Drum, fill it up with tarragon and chili, four bay leaves black peppercorns and basil, powdered oregano something free </READING> maybe, about two teaspoon worth of salt. something free maybe you go out in your garden and just pick some weird herb and put that in there too, some tansy or something like that. <READING> now beyond the Sonora Pinacoti country buy a_ build a fire of ocotillo, broken twigs </READING> you know what those look like the ocotillo they're it's really beautiful they bloom in uh, uh early spring a bright, red, flowering bush an incredible thing <READING> broken twigs and bits of ironwood in an open ring of lava rake some coals aside and if you're smart, to windward </READING> he's telling you all about how to build a fire it's a great i hope i hope some of you guys are going camping as soon as the, term's over. <READING> set Drum's fourteen inch Dutch oven with three legs across the embers </READING> he tells you all how to do it put the, you know the bacon in the veg- have all your vegetables cleaned up, etcet- etcetera <READING> cover it up with a hot lid all heavy in weight or drink Budweiser beer. and also mix the dumpling mix </READING> and then he says, <READING> dish it up and eat it with a spoon sitting on a poncho in the dark </READING> you know i mean if you if you've, lived this way and y- you know how, how true to life this is i mean just, e- exactly how, good this is gonna taste when he, gets around to uh when you get around to eating it. so, you know uh, it's not, there're many poems by uh by Snyder that're really difficult whereas you r- you read them and you feel as if you've, you've had to, you know you've had to have read a lot of Buddhist scriptures and everything or you have to know a lot about the anthropology of the, California Indians, but it's wonderful that he's also capable of writing these, very very simple and straightforward, poems as well. uh, Snyder as a naturalist, oh that's a little bit i shoulda clicked on that. um, Snyder as a naturalist, uh, hi- his understanding of, the, big picture you know history from the, huge panorama of which the_ our lives as human beings are just tiny little dots. all that knowledge informs a poem like one called Burning the Small Dead Back Country, uh let's see i'm not ready for that yet Back Country um, uh, page thirteen Bo- Burning the Small Dead. l- let's look at this it's just about, making a fire up in the mountains <READING> burning the small dead branches broke from beneath thick spreading white bark kind, a hundred summers snow melt rock and air, hiss in a twisted bough. sierra granite Mount Ritter Black Rock twice as old, Deneb Altair, windy fire </READING> did anyone look up Deneb and Altair in the dictionary?
SS: stars
S1: stars, yeah, they're stars so what's happening in this poem? he's lighting a fire from these uh pine, from these pines and as they burn a hundred summers, of snow melt which gives the pines their uh, i don't know if you've ever been high up in like in in the mountains where you see trees that seem to be growing out of, rock? um, these trees that get their water from the snow melt, and you know their nourishment from the air and growing out of rock, a hundred summers, hiss in a twisted bough. all that growth that went in, to, to make that tree, that hisses, in this fire that you're building. and then uh, he just thinks about the rock, s- sierra granite Mount Ritter Black Rock twice as old he, he's just contemplating, the geological lives of all this rock out of which the trees, have grown and then, w- he's thinking about fire. because the poem is called Burning the Small Dead, and so wh- where did his where does his mind jump to? the stars. it's really nice, here's here's a fire, that i'm building, burning these trees, then bang what's another kind of fire? the stars. and what's another kind of uh fire? the_ a volcanic, volcanic, activity, that created, these rocks this black rock right here so it's really an interesting_ that's kinda y- wha- where you where you have to be when you're, reading Snyder is to be able to make those, mental leaps. uh t- going from one kind of a_ in this particular case, going from one kind of, fire to another. um, now the_ i'm having you read the prose book Earth Household, side by side with Dharma Bums and The Back Country. uh, i, called your attention to the subtitle of Earth Household Technical Notes and Queries to Fellow, Dharma Revolutionaries. uh, Dharma, from Buddhism, revolution, from Marxism. so it's an interesting, uh, coalescence between, Eastern thought, as represented by Buddhism and Western thought as represented by Marxism. um... i- i think it's hard now that the Soviet Union has, now that the Berlin Wall has fallen now that the Soviet Union has disappeared, uh, has i mean has disintegrated now that Marxism, as, it has come down, to us in history now that this_ now that we're living in a post-Marxist post-Communist, world, i think it's very hard for people, uh of your age to understand, the power that Marxism carried at its height because you see Marxism represents itself as being, uh scientific. and therefore, its ideas, had the cachet, of historical, inevitability. that's why when, Nikita Kruschev talked at the United Nations he took his shoe off and pounded the table, and addressing the American ambassador, or or American representative directly he said, we will bury you, because, the Marxists felt that they had the inevitability of history, on their side that the revolution was coming, and it was_ happen_ it was going to happen just as surely, as summer was going to turn into fall see so that's all, that- those_ that sense of h- the historical inevitability of Marxism, has just about disappeared, from the human scene, but in the fifties, when Snyder was writing, he felt as if, the revolution was definitely coming, and when he sai- when he talks about notes and queries to fellow Dharma Dharma revolutionaries, he's addressing himself to a group of like-minded people who feel that the revolution is inevitably coming, and what can we do, to make the revolution be the kind of revolution, that we want it to be... um, <START SOUND CLIP> i'm kind of flip-flopping back and forth here between, the, serious, intellectual political spiritual side, of Snyder, and the more, uh kind of laid back uh, uh, earthy side. you remember we read a poem called Night. here's a poem called North Beach Alba. Alba means what it means white. and, i- it's white because a lot of times when you get up in the morning in the Bay Area, the whole thing is socked in with fog, with white fog you may be_ a great bank of white fog, drifting in toward San Francisco over the Bay. <READING> waking half drunk in a strange pad making it out to the cool gray, San Francisco dawn, white gulls over white houses, fog down the Bay. Mount Tamel Pius a fresh green hill, in the new sun, driving across the bridge, in a beat old car to work.</READING> it's nice isn't it? you see the different kinds of white in it the white gulls the white houses the fog on the Bay? Mount Tamel Pius, is the mountain, in Marin County that you see when you look across the Bay, from San Francisco they call it the sleeping lady the uh, the um m- wha- which Indians live there? Medoc Indians, called it the sleeping lady because it looks like a, a woman. reclining.<P :05> so what are we gonna do now we're going to talk about, Gary Snyder's main ideas in Earth Household. they are six... and they are as follows. uh, the uh, interdependence be- in his own thinking and and in the thinking of like-minded people between Buddhism and revolution
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