Brianland

21st Century Beatniks versus Hieroglyphic Caricatures There’s long been a debate about the word “beatnik” — originally coined by a sensationalist San Francisco gossip columnist in 1958, playing on the Yiddish suffix “nik” and the first Russian satellite launched in September ’57 known as “Sputnik.”  Jack and Allen & company hated the word back in […]

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40 YEARS IN PRINT . A CHRONOLOGY OF THE PUBLISHED REAL-LIFE ADVENTURE TALES . . 1980 – April — John Anderson in San Diego – Blissfully Ravaged in Democracy – 1980–1984 chapter –  pp: 2–3 1980 – June — First Grateful Dead show – The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Jack Kerouac – ch. 14;  pp: 156–159 […]

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How History Could Have Been Different Kerouac’s and Otherwise . It was a quiet day in Facelandia when my Beat / Deadhead friend Steve Silberman posted: “Social media is amazing sometimes. In response to my posting a Cape Cod Times article about Kerouac’s time there, a woman posted a previously unseen photo of Kerouac working […]

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. Neal Cassady — by Carolyn Cassady (courtesy of the Cassady fam) . From Dean Moriarty . . . to Dead immortality, The street-kid who read . . . was a legend in bed, But more than the lays . . . he inspired a blaze In the hearths of the writers . . . […]

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. . Jack fights back from off the Beaten track still alive at 95 with 55 books in print after his track star sprint  — through the pages of history, seeing around corners like Neal at the wheel, knockin over grammar cops and blowin past the door stops to hidden darkened jazz joints puffin on […]

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. Here’s the chapter on the now late great Paul Krassner from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Jack Kerouac about the time I met him and a buncha his croanies at the big Kerouac summit in 1982. I sent him this chapter when I was finishing up the book and he gave it his thumbs-up. . ch. 23 […]

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Midwest Tour — May 2019 . Thomas O’Shea House Party — Berea, outside Cleveland Ohio – Friday, May 10th, 2029 The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Jack Kerouac – the Marin Epiphany – from ch 26 – The Airplane Hanger in Marin The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Jack Kerouac – ch. 3 – Dancin’ to The Boulder Boogie – Who […]

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The Home of The Scroll & The Girl Newly uncovered photos and corrections to history. “Bill felt completely at home on the rooftops of Manhattan.”Joan Haverty-Kerouac on Bill Cannastra I knew I loved this guy! 🙂 . To all in Beatlandia — Pretty much nobody’s ever seen these buried Beat family photos in a hundred […]

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Storming the Bastilles with Lungs Full of Nectar . Pamela Twining, Andy Clausen, & Brian Hassett — photo by Shiv Mirabito, at the Woodstock Shivastan Poetry Ashram, 2016 Two new books in poignant prose by poets of the streets just came out from insiders looking at the life and times of the Beat Generation — […]

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Al Hinkle — Hero of The Humble . Gracious Giant, Gentle Giant. A Literary Giant’s Character for Eternity — Still alive in every copy of On The Road in every country In The World, The lovable affable portable — Big Ed Dunkel, The Everyman in the car, man. Not a Cassady — Not a Kerouac, […]

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