Resistance To The Modernity of American Culture Essay example -- litera

In the poem Howl, Allen Ginsberg challenges the political modernity of American culture that enforces the â€Å"best minds† to give up their freedom to gain the desired sense of normalcy that is glorified. He states â€Å"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† (Ginsberg 9). That angry fix that he describes is what all of these â€Å"best minds† look for after being striped of their freedom to conform to the new American culture after World War II. Without question a â€Å"best mind† in Ginsberg’s reference is one with all the freedom and insight before the turn of American culture that explicitly loose it through modernity. The â€Å"best minds† were not necessarily the wealthy and eminent but the people who used freedom for expression. They were the ones opposing the American culture that battles Capitalist and Communist control that was arrived post World War II. The form of Ginsberg’s poem challenges the culture through the resistance of the â€Å"best minds†. Howl is separated to three sections that include long lines that look like paragraphs. Resisting classical poems, he arranges long sentences instead of breaking them into separate parts. This free verse poem reveals the unorthodox meter Ginsberg puts in place through the three parts. In the first section he repeats the word â€Å"who† before every line to address the â€Å"best minds† and how they are being destroyed. In the second, he does the same for the word â€Å"Moloch†. Moloch can be interpreted as the American culture that is the destroyer. He states: â€Å"Moloch the incomprehensible prison! Moloch the/ crossbone soulless jail house and congress of sorrows† (21). He explicitly spe... ...esisting as well. Ginsberg writes the â€Å"best minds† as ones who â€Å"created great suicidal dramas on the apartment cliff-banks† (15). Repeatedly, the â€Å"best minds† are left fantasizing suicide as a way out. In a society that glories the normality of living by restricting people from acting on their insights, it develops a resistance to the American culture. Once the â€Å"best minds† of the generation have their freedom stripped from them in order to conform to the views in modernity, they resist through harsh substances for intoxication. When they realize the power of politics in America it forms suicidal thoughts for a way out. Works Cited Ginsberg, Allen. Howl, and other poems. San Francisco: City Lights Pocket Bookshop, 1956. Print. Asher, Levi. â€Å"Carl Solomon.† Literary Kicks. N.p., Aug. 1994. Web. 15 Jan. 2014.