Who were the original hipsters? In this dazzling collection, Glenn O'Brien provides a kaleidoscopic guided tour through the margins and subterranean tribes of mid-twentieth century America-the worlds of jazz, of disaffected postwar youth, of those alienated by racial and sexual exclusion, of outlaws and drug users creating their own dissident networks. Whether labeled as Bop or Beat or Punk, these outsider voices ignored or suppressed by the mainstream would merge and recombine in unpredictable ways, and change American culture forever. To read The Cool School is to experience the energies of that vortex. Drawing on memoirs, poems, novels, comedy routines, letters, essays, and song lyrics, O'Brien creates an unparalleled literary mix tape bringing together Henry Miller, Miles Davis, Jack Kerouac, Diane di Prima, Lenny Bruce, William S. Burroughs, Bob Dylan, Annie Ross, Norman Mailer, Terry Southern, Andy Warhol, Lester Bangs, and dozens of others, including such legendary figures as Beat avatar Neal Cassady, jazz memoirist Babs Gonzales, inspired comic improviser Lord Buckley, no-holds-barred essayist Seymour Krim, and underground filmmaker Jack Smith. His one-of-a-kind anthology recreates an unforgettable era in all its hallucinatory splendor- transgressive, raucous, unruly, harrowing, and often subversively hilarious.
Product Identifiers
Publisher
The Library of America
ISBN-13
9781598532562
eBay Product ID (ePID)
189947782
Product Key Features
Book Title
The Cool School: Writing from America's Hip Underground: a Library of America Special Publication
Author
Glenn O'brien
Format
Hardcover
Language
English
Topic
Literature, Literary Theory
Publication Year
2013
Number of Pages
500 Pages
Dimensions
Item Height
216mm
Item Width
146mm
Item Weight
658g
Additional Product Features
Country/Region of Manufacture
United States
Editor
Glenn O'brien
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