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Giving Up Poetry: With Allen Ginsberg at Hollyhock
In May 1985, author Trevor Carolan was offered the chance to attend a workshop with Allen Ginsberg at Hollyhock Farm on Cortes Island, British Columbia. For Carolan, a journalist, aspiring poet, and fan of Ginsberg’s poetics, the opportunity couldn’t be turned down. Giving Up Poetry recounts Carolan’s transformation under Ginsberg’s influence, and reveals an intimate portrait of Ginsberg as an icon and inspiring leader, as well as a man of appetites, disappointments, wisdom and lusts.
102 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2001
3 people want to read
About the author
Trevor Carolan
21 books1 followerTrevor Carolan(born 1951) is a Canadian writer. He has published 16 books of non-fiction, poetry, fiction, translations and anthologies.
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November 30, 2019
This was a pleasant and easy read. Trevor Carolan is openly a huge fan of Ginsberg, and his book is in many ways a kind of loving … what? I was going to write ‘tribute’, but that isn’t quite it. Even as he praises Ginsberg’s presence and Taoist/Zen-like approach to writing, Carolan sees with love and forgiveness some small examples of Ginsberg’s human frailties, such as Ginsberg’s egoistic dismissal of the wisdom of doing daily meditation/sadhana practice, and the casual way Ginsberg made a pass at him after some platonic intimacy in a hot tub under the stars on a small island far from civilization in Hollyhock, a self described ‘Lifelong Learning Centre’ aka ‘New Age Retreat’, on the coast of British Columbia.
Was this book as much or more about discovering something about Ginsberg than about what Carolan learned in order to 'Give Up Poetry'? For me it was, given that after reading Gingsberg’s ‘Howl’ and writing a university paper on it many years ago, I had no interest in Ginsberg’s poetry. Nor him. And in the end I have no idea whether or not Carolan did in fact give up writing poem-like words, or stopped trying to force words to be poetical and came to write poetry.
Shortly into the book I thought I might begin to find Ginsberg at least a little interesting because it turns out that Ginsberg had an interest in and was inspired by Taoist, Hindu Zen/Buddhist(?) philosophy. And was very active in their advocacy and practice and applied it to the ‘philosophy’ of how to write poetry. (To be honest, that genuinely surprised me.)
However, Ginsberg returned to being relatively non-interesting when he displayed his egoistic attitude toward the daily practice of Tai Chi. After noticing that Ginsberg’s Tai Chi form was ‘rusty’ and ‘a little stiff’, Carolan asked him about his daily practice. Carolan was surprised to learn that Ginsberg did not practice daily, despite having directed the students about the importance of daily practice (p31). Ginsberg elaborated that “When you get to a certain level I don’t think you have to do it every day. It’s okay to knock off now and again, just so long as you keep at it. I think it would become relentless otherwise” (p49-50 my emphasis). “Relentless”? I am baffled by that, what it could possibly mean, or what Ginsberg meant by it.
And for me this restored Ginsberg back to being relatively uninteresting. I accept that that may be a bit harsh, but for me that observation largely invalidates the other ‘true’ bon mots and words of wisdom Ginsberg shared on that writer’s retreat, and which Carolan appears to have found helpful. For example, after Carolan dismissed self publishing as something to be dismissed as vanity publishing, Ginsberg castigated him with: “It’s self-publishing and it is an old tradition among poets … I self-published my own first work in New York. A lady helped me, although everyone seems to think that my career began with Howl” (p74). Ginsberg added that it’s not ‘vanity’ press if you put all your effort into making it as best as you can. (And has that given me an okay and self-publish my own poetry, on paper with ink as opposed to the cloud and webs? Perhaps.)
I really did enjoy the review of Carolan’s work by Ginsberg, hence the Chapter ‘Giving up Poetry’, from which we infer that Carolan did just that. What is left to our imagination, unless you are familiar with Carolan having written poetry subsequent to the retreat, which I am not, was whether he was able to drop the pretension of writing poetry, or simply stopped writing poetry at all. Carolan was personally schooled, with the corrections, about what it means to be a poet. About a particular poem, Ginsberg’s asked Carolan a lot of questions and seriously cut it into pieces. Embarrassed, Carolan finally exclaimed, “‘Keep it simple? Sure, you can say that, but it isn’t poetry then. It’s just language.’” “‘Ahhhh,’” he interrupted. ‘It wouldn’t be poetry…. don’t you see?. As soon as we get hung up on the idea of writing ‘Poetry’, language automatically becomes something else, something grander, elevated. That’s what gets in the way of clear writing” (p73).
A nice read, but in the end it left me uninspired to pursue reading either Ginsberg or Carolan.
Addendum The following is not a review, but a biographical note about Ginsberg that some may find upsetting or irrelevant. Please do not read unless curious about a lesser known aspect of Ginsberg's biography that may temper your thoughts about his poetry, and his contributions to gay rights and obscenity laws.
With a strange kind of timing, my sister happened to stay with my partner and I for the weekend as I was writing this. She noticed the book, and said “Did you know that Ginsberg paedophile?” “No, I did not.” (And I had only recently learned that Ginsberg was a homosexual, after watching, a week or two earlier because of my partner, the film ‘Kill Your Darlings’, a biography of Ginsberg's university years.) Nor do I know that he was a paedophile, but for various reasons my sister has done meticulous research for the last 10 years around these issues, and so I have no reason to doubt her. She added “He was an open member of NAMBLA." And from Wikipedia's entry on Ginsberg I learned that Ginsberg was openly a member of NAMBLA, which is "the North American Man/Boy Love Association, a pedophilia and pederasty advocacy organization in the United States that works to abolish age of consent laws and legalize sexual relations between adults and children” (Wikipedia ‘Allen Ginsberg’ 2019.11, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_G...).
Was this book as much or more about discovering something about Ginsberg than about what Carolan learned in order to 'Give Up Poetry'? For me it was, given that after reading Gingsberg’s ‘Howl’ and writing a university paper on it many years ago, I had no interest in Ginsberg’s poetry. Nor him. And in the end I have no idea whether or not Carolan did in fact give up writing poem-like words, or stopped trying to force words to be poetical and came to write poetry.
Shortly into the book I thought I might begin to find Ginsberg at least a little interesting because it turns out that Ginsberg had an interest in and was inspired by Taoist, Hindu Zen/Buddhist(?) philosophy. And was very active in their advocacy and practice and applied it to the ‘philosophy’ of how to write poetry. (To be honest, that genuinely surprised me.)
However, Ginsberg returned to being relatively non-interesting when he displayed his egoistic attitude toward the daily practice of Tai Chi. After noticing that Ginsberg’s Tai Chi form was ‘rusty’ and ‘a little stiff’, Carolan asked him about his daily practice. Carolan was surprised to learn that Ginsberg did not practice daily, despite having directed the students about the importance of daily practice (p31). Ginsberg elaborated that “When you get to a certain level I don’t think you have to do it every day. It’s okay to knock off now and again, just so long as you keep at it. I think it would become relentless otherwise” (p49-50 my emphasis). “Relentless”? I am baffled by that, what it could possibly mean, or what Ginsberg meant by it.
And for me this restored Ginsberg back to being relatively uninteresting. I accept that that may be a bit harsh, but for me that observation largely invalidates the other ‘true’ bon mots and words of wisdom Ginsberg shared on that writer’s retreat, and which Carolan appears to have found helpful. For example, after Carolan dismissed self publishing as something to be dismissed as vanity publishing, Ginsberg castigated him with: “It’s self-publishing and it is an old tradition among poets … I self-published my own first work in New York. A lady helped me, although everyone seems to think that my career began with Howl” (p74). Ginsberg added that it’s not ‘vanity’ press if you put all your effort into making it as best as you can. (And has that given me an okay and self-publish my own poetry, on paper with ink as opposed to the cloud and webs? Perhaps.)
I really did enjoy the review of Carolan’s work by Ginsberg, hence the Chapter ‘Giving up Poetry’, from which we infer that Carolan did just that. What is left to our imagination, unless you are familiar with Carolan having written poetry subsequent to the retreat, which I am not, was whether he was able to drop the pretension of writing poetry, or simply stopped writing poetry at all. Carolan was personally schooled, with the corrections, about what it means to be a poet. About a particular poem, Ginsberg’s asked Carolan a lot of questions and seriously cut it into pieces. Embarrassed, Carolan finally exclaimed, “‘Keep it simple? Sure, you can say that, but it isn’t poetry then. It’s just language.’” “‘Ahhhh,’” he interrupted. ‘It wouldn’t be poetry…. don’t you see?. As soon as we get hung up on the idea of writing ‘Poetry’, language automatically becomes something else, something grander, elevated. That’s what gets in the way of clear writing” (p73).
A nice read, but in the end it left me uninspired to pursue reading either Ginsberg or Carolan.
Addendum The following is not a review, but a biographical note about Ginsberg that some may find upsetting or irrelevant. Please do not read unless curious about a lesser known aspect of Ginsberg's biography that may temper your thoughts about his poetry, and his contributions to gay rights and obscenity laws.
With a strange kind of timing, my sister happened to stay with my partner and I for the weekend as I was writing this. She noticed the book, and said “Did you know that Ginsberg paedophile?” “No, I did not.” (And I had only recently learned that Ginsberg was a homosexual, after watching, a week or two earlier because of my partner, the film ‘Kill Your Darlings’, a biography of Ginsberg's university years.) Nor do I know that he was a paedophile, but for various reasons my sister has done meticulous research for the last 10 years around these issues, and so I have no reason to doubt her. She added “He was an open member of NAMBLA." And from Wikipedia's entry on Ginsberg I learned that Ginsberg was openly a member of NAMBLA, which is "the North American Man/Boy Love Association, a pedophilia and pederasty advocacy organization in the United States that works to abolish age of consent laws and legalize sexual relations between adults and children” (Wikipedia ‘Allen Ginsberg’ 2019.11, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_G...).
Displaying 1 of 1 review