"Born in the wake of World War II, and reaching expressive peaks during the otherwise staid 1950s, the Beat Generation was the first in American history to defiantly break from the past and point the way forward for young Americans. Every subculture to emerge since owes a debt to the Beats, who left an indelible mark on American history." "Drawing on extensive research to show just how profound an impact the Beats had on American culture, politics, and literature, Beatniks: A Guide to an American Subculture gets the readers past the caricature of the "beatnik" as a goateed, beret-wearing, bongo-playing poseur. Beatniks conveys the complexity, influences, events, and places that shaped the Beat Generation form the late 1940s to the cusp of the 1960s. The book also features a series of essays on specific aspects of the subculture, as well as interviews with Beat Generation luminaries like Allen Ginsberg, Ann Charters, Roy Harper, and Michael McClure." "Throughout, readers will meet an extraordinary gallery of people both famous - Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs, Neal Cassidy - and lesser known but no less fascinating, including Kenneth Patchen, Lord Buckley, Mort Sahl, Jack Micheline, Lew Welch, Joan Vollmer Adams, and Lenore Kandel."--Jacket.