Today, we are proud to announce the release of Beatdom #24 – the West Coast issue. For this issue of our literary journal, we have chosen to look at the Beat and Beat-adjacent literary scene of the West Coast of the United States, with—perhaps unsurprisingly—a bit of an emphasis on San Francisco.
We have essays on Kenneth Rexroth and Robert Duncan (neither of whom was technically Beat, but both of course were tied to the movement) and essays about how the West Coast created the Beats and then morphed them into the hippies. We also have interviews and reviews that discuss Beat and Beat-related writers and their West Coast lives and works. There is some discussion, too, of later artists like Jerry Garcia, Janis Joplin, and Ken Kesey.
Here’s the list of contents:
- Go West, Young Beats, by Ryan Mathews
- Kenneth Rexroth: West Coast Bard, by David S. Wills
- Private(s) Practice, by Kaley Hensley
- Gary Snyder Noticed my Face Tattoo, by Tony Wallin-Sato
- Lisa Says, by Kurt Hemmer
- Eileen Myles Interview, by Sylas Yarad
- Among the Stars, by Yorio Hirano
- A Note on Climate and Culture, Weldon Kees
- Soheyl Dahi Interview, by Ryan Mathews
- He, Leo: A Review
- Material Wealth: A Review
- Becoming Kerouac: A Review
- Discoveries, by Barry Garelick
- And the Hippies Were Boiled in Their Tank Tops, by Leon Horton
You can read a little more about each piece here.
Beatdom #24 is now on sale at Amazon as a print book and a Kindle title. We sell the PDF on Gumroad and Water Row Books in Michigan will soon have some copies for sale. You can also go pester your local bookshop and tell them to stock Beatdom.
If you have trouble ordering, wish to place a bulk order at a discounted price, or are ordering on behalf of a non-profit or educational organisation, then contact us here.
