Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 134

Essay Example standards, innovation style, experimentation with drugs, alternative sexualities, interest in eastern religion, and rejection of materialism and claims of national consciousness. Kerounac, one of the ‘beat’ writers allows that it was it was street hustler Harbert Huncke who originally used the phrase ‘beat’ in an earlier discussion with him. ‘beat’ could colloquially mean ‘beaten down’ with the African-American community of the period and had developed from the image ‘beat to his socks’. One of the beat writers however altered the image and the meaning to include the connotations upbeat, beatific and a musical association of being ‘on the beat. John Clellon Holmes writes the article ‘This is the Beat Generation’ in New york Times Magazine in November 16, 1952 which gives several sentiments about the generation culture. The first concern is an eighteen-year old California girl who had been picked up for smoking marijuana and wanted to talk about it. In view of her contention, one of every five people you meet from the beat generation is a user of marijuana and people should leave them alone to do their own things. The writer is also concerned with a girl sentiment in a court courthouse for stealing a car and says that she believed small business to be dead and it intended to become a comfortable cog in the in the largest corporation it could find. The same generation is caught in the uncovering of the first non-virgin club in Illinois. The writer brings out the image of a group that drinks themselves to relaxation and as a way to solve their problems. Their sexuality morals are in question when the author points out that secretary of the beat generation are confused if to sleep with their boyfriends anytime, anywhere or to wait. They drink around and drive off to Detroit on a whim. The author sees the origin of the word ‘beat’ as obscure. To him it implies the feeling of having been used while still raw. He interprets it like some