Beat Scene

25/07/2024

LEGENDS OF LITTLE CANADA by Charlie Garguilo is a fairly new book I've been reading today. Gargiulo lived in Little Canada in the 1960s and he is here writing from the viewpoint of his 12 year self. If you have read Jack Kerouac you will know of Little Canada. 65 pages in and I'm hooked. The Catholic church looms large. The priests and the nuns. But so too does Marvel Comics, that kind of stuff. But Charlie has demons to contend with. A tough life. The nuns don't make it any easier. Little Canada, in the shadow of the Gothic St. Jeanne Baptiste church. And that too figures in Charlie's recalling of life back then in this inner city enclave. It's brilliant. Go to www.loompress.com

18/07/2024

Coming shortly in the Beat Scene Press chapbook series - BRION GYSIN - DEAR ROGER: LETTERS TO ROGER KNOEBBER 1962-1984 - 125 numbered copies in the regular chapbook series - pre-orders being taken now - contact [email protected]

27/06/2024

Ted Berrigan, a livewire poetry man. Known in Beat Generation circles as the man who went to interview Jack Kerouac in his twilight years on behalf of The Paris Review, whose poetry editor was his pal Tom Clark. Berrigan, very much a new wave New York School poet, if any tag is really needed, friend of another livewire, Anne Waldman and others like Clark, Joe Brainard, Lewis Warsh, Dick Gallup and the list goes on. Interviewing Jack Kerouac with him were Aram Saroyan and Duncan McNaughton. But who was Ted Berrigan, he dropped off the planet well before his time? In a new Beat Scene Press chapbook his wife Alice Notley, a feted poet in her own right, recalls him. The chapbook is in the regular 8″x5″ inches format with fold over covers, an edition of 125 numbered copies. If anyone is interested contact me on [email protected]

20/05/2024

Beat Scene Number 110 will be issued shortly. If you are interested in buying a copy please email me at [email protected]

26/04/2024

In a box here, just yesterday. Found. 29 years old. German language issue of Rolling Stone magazine. It includes a six page feature on Herbert Huncke. They call him The King of Times Square. Some neat photos.

29/03/2024

A snippet from Beat Scene 109. [Courtesy of Dave Pedersen of Maze Books]

29/03/2024

A heartening photo from Dave Pedersen owner of the Maze Books store. The new Beat Scene on display in the shop. Thanks for your order Dave. Maze is a general used bookstore I understand. They have a fondness for the Beat Generation writers and all those connected with them. If it is within a reasonable distance of you it sounds like a place to visit – if you like old fangled things like books. They are at 406 E. State Street, Rockford, Illinois 61104, USA. Email is [email protected] and the site is https://www.maze-books.com/

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13/03/2024

There is a new issue of Beat Scene - Number 109 - out this week. Anyone interested get in touch at [email protected]

22/12/2023

William Burroughs - The Frisco Kid He Never Returns with Shadow Routines from Iain Sinclair - just got this from Michael Curran's Tangerine Press. Fascinating stuff. Michael Curran is a throwback. Real craftsman. https://www.thetangerinepress.com

18/11/2023

Another early and sold out here issue of Beat Scene is on sale at Third Mind Books in Ann Arbor in Michigan. A real used bookstore who seem to have a thriving Beat Generation/alternative section. Here's the link.

Coventry, England: Beat Scene Press, 1996. First Printing. Stapled Wrappers. This vintage early 1996 number of the magazine-format literary journal published & edited by Kevin Ring in the UK features a special section dedicated to the controversy over the estate of Jack Kerouac, including a lengthy....

18/11/2023

People ask me about this particular issue of my Beat Scene magazine. Sadly I have to tell them it is no longer available. But for those in the USA there are copies - go to Third Mind Books in Ann Arbor in Michigan. A real bricks and mortar bookstore. Here's the link -

Coventry, England: Beat Scene Press, 1997. First Printing. Stapled Wrappers. This vintage number of the Beat Generation magazine published by Kevin Ring in the UK features a special central section in tribute to William S. Burroughs upon his death on August 2, 1997. This stirring & deeply reflective...

17/11/2023

Beat Scene 108 will be out in a day or two. It is £9 in the UK. 16 Euros in Europe and $20 USA in the rest of the world. If you would like a copy email me at [email protected]

17/11/2023

This long link will take you to Third Mind Books in Ann Arbor in Michigan. It's a real bookstore.

Charles Lloyd Quartet; West Coast Natural Gas Co.; Fried, Robert; Hillyard, Roger; van Meter, Ben Original Concert Poster: Charles Lloyd Quartet, West Coast Natural Gas Co. (August 3-6, 1967) San Francisco, CA: Family Dog Productions, 1967. First Edition. Single Sheet. A poster (appx. 14" x 20") ann...

17/11/2023

Another issue of Beat Scene available in the USA at Third Mind Books in Ann Arbor, Michigan - a real go in the door bookstore -

Coventry, England: The Beat Scene Press, 2014. First Printing. Stapled Wrappers. This number of the magazine-format literary journal published by Kevin Ring in the UK is a special issue devoted to the Beats in Britain. With great, rarely reproduced 1966 photographs of a dapper William S. Burroughs i...

17/11/2023

Another edition of Beat Scene, this time from 2012, on offer at Third Mind Mind Books in Ann Arbor, Michigan - a real bricks and mortar establishment.

Coventry, England: The Beat Scene Press, Winter 2012. First Printing. Staplebound. This number of Kevin Ring's journal is chock-full cover-to-cover with fascinating & significant essays, interviews, memoirs & reviews centering on the core figures of the Beat Generation: An insightful essay on Allen....

17/11/2023

This issue of a Beat Scene special edition KODAK MANTRA DIARIES by Iain Sinclair, from 2006 is on offer at Third Mind Books in Ann Arbor, Michigan - a real bookshop!

Coventry, England: Beat Scene Press, 2006. First Edition Thus; First Printing. Stapled Wrappers. This fascinating assemblage of documents, a scrapbook montage of personal anecdote, reflection, audio transcription and objectivist reportage, provides a useful historical period reconstruction of the so...

17/11/2023

This from the fine Ann Arbor bookstore Third Mind Books -

Paris, France: The Olympia Press, 1962. First Printing. Softcover. Maurice Girodias rebranded his father’s Obelisk Press as the Olympia Press in 1953 as a publisher of avant-garde and provocative literature that otherwise was not welcomed by the English-speaking world. The French didn’t take lon...

11/11/2023

As an experiment Beat Scene 94, a Jack Kerouac special issue from 2019, is being made available in digital format for a limited period. The print issue sold out in 2019. If you are interested in seeing a simple PDF version of this issue get in touch. The cost is a mere £5 UK. I'm at [email protected]

15/10/2023

A bigger Beat Scene Press chapbook. By Jean Francois Duval.

06/10/2023

THE BURROUGHS FLYER by James Birmingham is the forthcoming chapbook in the Beat Scene series. Number 80. In the regular 8"x5" format, with cover flaps. 125 numbered copies. Anyone interested email me at [email protected]

Further to this latest Beat Scene chapbook THE BURROUGHS FLYER by James Birmingham – English writer Iain Sinclair has read it and got in touch about James talking about the late, well admired English bookdealer Martin Stone (also a rock musician with bands like Mighty Baby, Savoy Brown) and how it would have been something for Martin to have fronted a book search show on TV. Here’s what Iain Sinclair told me a day or two ago (and Iain is no stranger to book selling in his formative years) – “…a PS after reading James Birmingham’s nifty piece. He says that he’d like to see a TV show ‘following Martin Stone’ as he searches for rare books. You could tell him that the pilot already exists & is out there on the internet. It’s called ‘The Cardinal & the Corpse’. A pretty accurate portrait of that period in the used-book trade & some of the collected authors. My one claim to future fame in this mythology is that I introduced Peter Howard to Martin, driving him down to Cannon Street Road & the house that features in ‘White Chappell, Scarlet Tracings’. Instant connection between those 2 obsessive bibliophiles.”

17/09/2023

Do I publish anything on William Burroughs, someone asked recently? Is the Pope a Catholic? Somethings from the fairly recent past.

17/09/2023

Thanks to Larry Farber at Larry's Corner in Stockholm in Sweden who recently ordered a couple of boxes of Beat Scene back issues and for being so enthusiastic about them - making a little film of them on display at his store. It seems to be a cafe, music venue, record store - lots of vinyl. And lots of books. Here is the little Instagram link - https://www.instagram.com/p/CxIZTyns_6F/?hl=en-gb So, if you live in Sweden a place to check out. Even order a copy of Beat Scene. They are at - Grindsgatan 35, 118 57 Stockholm, Sweden

14/09/2023

Beat Scene friend and scholar Don Heneghan continues to bang the drum for Kerouac and Co. Don is giving talks and setting up a photo exhibit at Maze Books in Rockford, Illinois on Friday Oct 6 and Saturday Oct 7. You might recall Don edited a bibliography of the City Lights Pocket Poets series - published through the Grolier Book Club, a few years back. Maze Books, owned and run by Dave Pedersen, is a new and used bookstore which has a thriving Beat Generation/Alternative section. The store is at 406 E. State Street, Rockford, Illinois 61104, USA. They have a site - www-maze-books.com --- Wish I could be there.

03/09/2023

ULTRAZONE: A TANGIER GHOST STORY is by Mark Terrill and Francis Poole. It's a 350 page novel - William Burroughs and his pals are the actors in this imaginative, innovative, spellbinding story, which brings Burroughs - as a ghost, alive. Not only that but Ian Somerville, Paul Bowles too. They drift through the Tangier of today, trying to solve one big problem. I'm not giving the story away. They mingle with the living. It is, at once, a serious story but with a sometimes light funny side, tapping into the old time belief systems of North Africa. It's a wonderful read. Would imagine any Burroughs reader would delight in this.

28/08/2023

JACK KEROUAC: Lonesome Traveller in London - 1957 by Tim Chamberlain is the new Beat Scene Press chapbook. Number 79 in this long running series. The regular series format. 125 numbered copies. OUT NOW. If interested email me at [email protected]

15/08/2023

All pre-ordered copies of JACK KEROUAC AND THE DHARMA BUMS by Ann Charters have now been mailed out. A whole box of them just early this morning. Thank you to all those who placed an order. Without you....

09/08/2023

In the post yesterday. I had reviewed an advance proof copy of this book in Beat Scene 107 and interviewed author Simon Petherick and was pleased to get a finished hardcover edition today. An unusual and very readable what if novel. Thought provoking.

09/08/2023

Beat Scene this morning in writer Peter Hollywood's garden. Peter said "Good Lord, who is Hillary Louise Johnson? I've been reading and re-reading the brilliant article on Gary Snyder in the new issue. You know how much I love Snyder and this was such a joy to read. Real up-to-date (ish) info about the great man. But also, so wonderfully written. For example: '...he is just another woodland creature...' or (and this is magnificent) 'it's a little like trying to convey the graceful lope of a bear from a paw print...' (The alliterating of the p in lope with paw and print - words are paw prints too.)
I've read it a couple of times out in my wee patch of garden in suburban South Belfast. Didn't want to read it indoors. Will take the issue up to Donegal next week and read it again in more rugged surroundings. Then go for a zinging swim in the cold Atlantic.
The rest of the issue is great also, I may add. Will take some of Gary's poetry with me too; maybe 'Earth House Hold' too."

05/08/2023

A note from Ann Charters this morning. August 21 at the Gloucester Writers Center, 126 East Main Street, Gloucester, Massachusetts. Ann will give a talk CHARLES OLSON & THE ACADEMY. For more information go to www.GloucesterWriters.org

29/07/2023

A fresh Beat Scene Press chapbook out in a few days. JACK KEROUAC and the DHARMA BUMS by Ann Charters. In the regular series format. 125 numbered copies. This is No 78 chapbook in the ongoing collection. Anyone interested please email [email protected]