Name: Ferlinghetti: A Life - Paperback
Brand: Books by splitShops
SKU: 9781574232592
Price: 18.95 USD
Availability: OutOfStock
ISBN: 9781574232592

Ferlinghetti: A Life - Paperback

$18.95

Report copyright infringement

by Neeli Cherkovski (Author)

"No one mulling this gentle record will fail to be moved."
--San Francisco Chronicle

Poet, publisher, bookseller, activist--this is the story of Lawrence Ferlinghetti, the bookshop he made a landmark in San Francisco, and a life beautifully lived with writers and books.

In the mid-1950s a group of San Francisco-based writers emerged as a central force in American letters. Self-styled bohemians, disillusioned with the old American dream of prosperity and conformity, they harangued these "virtues" in their writings. They became known as the Beat Generation. Their ranks included Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, and Gregory Corso. But the unifying force among them was an unassuming, almost painfully shy young poet named Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

As owner of the now legendary City Lights Booksellers and its publishing enterprises, City Lights Publishers and its Pocket Poet Series, Ferlinghetti promoted the writings of his rebellious contemporaries, and continually looked for new talent to publish, while conducting a parallel though more personal search for self-identity through his own work. Although that search began with a lonely, unstable childhood in which he never knew his real parents, it would not become manifest until years later with the 1958 publication of his first collection of poems, A Coney Island of the Mind--that debut would go on to sell more than one million copies and become one of the bestselling and most popular books of poetry ever published.

In this, the first biography of Ferlinghetti ever published (originally released in 1979), Neeli Cherkovski recreates those early years of the poet-publisher and examines the content and import of his work. Long out-of-print, this is a crucial literary document by a man who knew the legendary poet-publisher-bookseller intimately.

This expanded edition--published just one year after Ferlinghetti's passing in 2021 at the age of 101--includes a fascinating, hilarious new foreword about how the book came to be written in the late 1970s, an epilogue covering the last forty years of Ferlinghetti's life, and a personal, tender afterword about the long relationship between the author and his subject.

For readers interested in American culture and how a business can make social change, this is an irresistible story of a long life very well lived.

Number of Pages: 272

Dimensions: 1.2 x 9 x 6 IN

Publication Date: May 17, 2022

Made with care

Great value

Elegant design

Quality materials

This product is crafted with quality materials to ensure durability and performance. Designed with your convenience in mind, it seamlessly fits into your everyday life.

We strive to process and ship all orders in a timely manner, working diligently to ensure that your items are on their way to you as soon as possible.

We are committed to ensuring a positive shopping experience for all our customers. If for any reason you wish to return an item, we invite you to reach out to our team for assistance, and we will evaluate every return request with care and consideration.