Routines, Expanded Edition

by Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Routines,  first published by New Directions in 1964 and going through four printings, is now reissued with the addition of three more of Ferlinghetti's very short experimental plays.  A reissue of Ferlinghetti's very short experimental plays (1965) with three new plays added to the original thirteen. In this collection Ferlinghetti takes a revolutionary look at modern theater and explores the area between old-style drama and spontaneous improvisation by supplying a blueprint for dramatic actionan outline from which director and actors may create and interpret freely. In one called '"Our Little Trip" two men in conservative suits wind themselves in and out of a long bandage while a questioner circles them seeking Meaning. "Servants of the People" puts on political podium hogs in torrents of cliches. "Bearded Lady 'Dies'" features the Second Coming all decked out for newspaper coverage.

Genres: Plays, Poetry, Drama, Fiction

128 pages, Paperback

First published December 12, 1964

About the author

A prominent voice of the wide-open poetry movement that began in the 1950s, Lawrence Ferlinghetti has written poetry, translation, fiction, theater, art criticism, film narration, and essays. Often concerned with politics and social issues, Ferlinghetti’s poetry countered the literary elite's definition of art and the artist's role in the world. Though imbued with the commonplace, his poetry cannot be simply described as polemic or personal protest, for it stands on his craftsmanship, thematics, and grounding in tradition.

Ferlinghetti was born in Yonkers in 1919, son of Carlo Ferlinghetti who was from the province of Brescia and Clemence Albertine Mendes-Monsanto. Following his undergraduate years at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, he served in the U.S. Navy in World War II as a ship's commander. He received a Master’s degree from Columbia University in 1947 and a Doctorate de l’Université de Paris (Sorbonne) in 1950. From 1951 to 1953, when he settled in San Francisco, he taught French in an adult education program, painted, and wrote art criticism. In 1953, with Peter D. Martin (son of Carlo Tresca) he founded City Lights Bookstore, the first all-paperbound bookshop in the country, and by 1955 he had launched the City Lights publishing house.

The bookstore has served for half a century as a meeting place for writers, artists, and intellectuals. City Lights Publishers began with the Pocket Poets Series, through which Ferlinghetti aimed to create an international, dissident ferment. His publication of Allen Ginsberg’s Howl & Other Poems in 1956 led to his arrest on obscenity charges, and the trial that followed drew national attention to the San Francisco Renaissance and Beat movement writers. (He was overwhelmingly supported by prestigious literary and academic figures, and was acquitted.) This landmark First Amendment case established a legal precedent for the publication of controversial work with redeeming social importance.

Ferlinghetti’s paintings have been shown at various galleries around the world, from the Butler Museum of American Painting to Il Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Rome. He has been associated with the international Fluxus movement through the Archivio Francesco Conz in Verona. He has toured Italy, giving poetry readings in Roma, Napoli, Bologna, Firenze, Milano, Verona, Brescia, Cagliari, Torino, Venezia, and Sicilia. He won the Premio Taormino in 1973, and since then has been awarded the Premio Camaiore, the Premio Flaiano, the Premio Cavour. among others. He is published in Italy by Oscar Mondadori, City Lights Italia, and Minimum Fax. He was instrumental in arranging extensive poetry tours in Italy produced by City Lights Italia in Firenze. He has translated from the italian Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Poemi Romani, which is published by City Lights Books. In San Francisco, his work can regularly be seen at the George Krevsky Gallery at 77 Geary Street.

Ferlinghetti’s A Coney Island of the Mind continues to be the most popular poetry book in the U.S. It has been translated into nine languages, and there are nearly 1,000,000 copies in print. The author of poetry, plays, fiction, art criticism, and essays, he has a dozen books currently in print in the U.S., and his work has been translated in many countries and in many languages. His most recent books are A Far Rockaway of the Heart (1997), How to Paint Sunlight (2001), and Americus Book I (2004) published by New Directions.

He has been the recipient of numerous prizes, including the Los Angeles Times’ Robert Kirsch Award, the BABRA Award for Lifetime Achievement, the National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Award for Contribution to American Arts and Letters, the American Civil Liberties Union’s Earl Warren Civil Liberties Award. Ferlinghetti was named San Francisco’s first poet laureate.

Reviews

[Mat · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not quite as spectacular as his work usually is (or how I have come to expect him to be...), Routines by Ferlinghetti is a great fish slap across the face, coming from a poet who writes brilliant but reasonably grounded and relatable poems.

Taking a leaf out of Burroughs' book, Ferlinghetti writes these routine burlesques in order to convey messages in ways that he never could through his poetry.
The Inspector with the Baggy Pants was one of my favourites and every ageing male could at some level, no matter how small, relate to this story.

I know that Ferlinghetti was also inspired not only by his fellow beats back home but also by some of the European (especially French) surrealist poets (such as Artaud) and playwrights (such as Ionesco) and this influence really rings through here in this book. And let's not forget Sartre.

Anyway, this is an interesting book but don't pick it up expecting another fantastic and stellar collection of poems from this legendary poet who is still alive today in his 90s! Read it if you are ready for something quirky, enlightening (its portrayal of common voices from the 60s I thought was brilliant) or something bizarre, vermin or absurd. I wrote this half snoozing so I hope I didn't forget to cross my peas or dot my sighs. Enjoy.

[Tentatively, Convenience · Rating 4 out of 5]

As usual, it's strange looking at these bks that I read over 3 decades ago. Maybe I read this when I was 19, maybe in 1972. At the time, I reckon I considered Ferlinghetti to be one of the major beat poets. Now, when I think of beat poets I just think of Ginsberg. Ferlinghetti seems more regional - like a San Francisco poet - sortof beat, sortof not beat. I don't know how he's historified. Even categorizing this in "plays" (wch is where I have it shelved in my library) seems a little over-pigeonholing - I mean these are ROUTINES, not necessarily PLAYS. A subtle difference, perhaps. Bks read when I was a teenager get lumped together in my vague memories w/ a certain feeling, the feeling of discovering & searching & finding political opinions I cd identify w/ & writing styles that seemed to reach from one person (the writer) to me (the reader) in some sort of direct way. I think of Hermann Hesse, eg - someone who wrote about hero's journeys taken by young men - Ferlinghetti seems like a figure encountered on my (anti-)hero's journey. If I read this when I was 19, I wd've been a hitch-hiker/drifter at the time - exploring the US under conditions w/ no money & not always friendly. I still have a fondness for Ferlinghetti that's probably somehow tied up w/ his connection to my late youth, to my groping in the dark for like-mindedness, for anti-war ethics, for.. something. Regardless, I actually lost interest in him fairly quickly.. - as if the bks were too simple, not radical enuf, maybe too 'spiritual' - a term that acquired pompous & simple-minded associations for me. As if by reading the few bks of his that I did, I'd "been there, done that" & had no more to learn from him. & that's probably entirely too simple-minded of ME.

[Cecilia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is fascinating. It's a series of short vignettes (he calls them Routines) set up to make you question stuff in your everyday life. It's a little dated, but still interesting as short pieces, and really most of it is unstagable (one includes a helicopter), but overall fun and confrontational.

[Fritz Misteli · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bizarre, but interesting mental imagery

[Josh Karaczewski · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bet attending any of these short, experimental drama pieces would have been an experience - but I feel they lose their impact when simply read.

[Rod · Rating 3 out of 5]

Second volume of Ferlinghetti's experiments in theater. Once again, quite enjoyable, with only a few winces in the dated feel, and much respect for the imaginative courage.

[kdburton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delightfully subversive and wickedly smart collection of little plays.

— owned, from Peacocke collection (had a little faded, thin receipt from an empire books tucked inside the front cover)

[Andrea Janov · Rating 3 out of 5]

Is it more avant garde to read a collection of avant garde plays then to go see them. For some reason, I just pictured every one of these being performed in PS1. LES.

[James]

picked up orginial paperback last weekend from estate sale