Bohemian criticism

The collection of poems “Howl”, written by Allen Ginsberg, is structured in three main parts: the first one describes scene, character and experience of the author in the community of artists, poets, musicians and drug users that he had met. The second part is a lament against the US government, which had been called “Moloch” in the poem, it is the name of the hotel that inspired Ginsberg during an hallucination. Finally, the third and last part talk about all the experiences, fears and hopes that the author had with Carl Solomon. The book has many references to the pop-culture such as film, for instance when he talks about “Saintly motorcyclists” he is referring to Marlon Brando in “The Wild One”, or in the second part of the poem when he writes about the “Moloch”: “Moloch whose breast is a cannibal dynamo! (…) Moloch whose skyscrapers stand in the long streets like endless Jahovas!”, those are all references from the film “Metropolis” by Fritz Lang in which the name of “moloch” is directly related to a monstrous factory.

“I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,

dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,

Angel-headed hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection

to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,”

In this long sentence Allen Ginsberg gives us a good image of artist’s communities at that period.  Nevertheless, he wrote most of these poems under the effects of hallucinogens and other drugs.  Thanks to his descriptions we can see a big movement against the US government and against the accepted way to live imposed by a capitalistic social structure. 

In conclusion, I found “Howl” a brilliant poem that critisizes the social system through a collection of experiences and bohemian characters alienated from the society, but pure in their spirits.