--- title: Allen Ginsberg Howl Reading in San Francisco: Oct. 7, 1955 description: Oct. 7, 1955: Allen Ginsberg reads 'Howl' for the first time, at San Francisco’s Six Gallery canonical: https://time.com/3462543/howl/ author: Jennifer Latson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-10-07T16:30:36.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-21T10:35:22.965Z article:section: Entertainment og:title: Allen Ginsberg Howl Reading in San Francisco: Oct. 7, 1955 og:description: Oct. 7, 1955: Allen Ginsberg reads 'Howl' for the first time, at San Francisco’s Six Gallery og:url: https://time.com/3462543/howl/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt035678c511c744a5/6986a729adae446a60545585/ginsberg.jpeg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Allen Ginsberg og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Allen Ginsberg Howl Reading in San Francisco: Oct. 7, 1955 twitter:description: Oct. 7, 1955: Allen Ginsberg reads 'Howl' for the first time, at San Francisco’s Six Gallery twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt035678c511c744a5/6986a729adae446a60545585/ginsberg.jpeg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Drunk Poetry Fans and the First Reading of 'Howl' by [Jennifer Latson](/author/jennifer-latson/) ## Jennifer Latson Oct 7, 2014 4:30 PM CUT  Allen Ginsberg in 1965 Allen Ginsberg in 1965Jim Johnson—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty by [Jennifer Latson](/author/jennifer-latson/) ## Jennifer Latson Oct 7, 2014 4:30 PM CUT Before Allen Ginsberg invoked the ire of authorities with the frank (and frequent) depiction of sexual acts in “Howl” — “[in empty lots & diner backyards, moviehouses’ rickety rows, on mountaintops in caves or with gaunt waitresses in familiar roadside lonely petticoat upliftings & especially secret gas-station solipsisms of johns, & hometown alleys too](http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/179381 "undefined")” — he stunned a crowd of drunk poetry fans at San Francisco’s Six Gallery. On this evening in 1955, Oct. 7, Ginsberg performed the piece in public for the first time at a poetry reading which had been advertised by a postcard[ proclaiming](http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/g%5Fl/ginsberg/performance.htm "undefined"): “Remarkable collection of angels all gathered at once in the same spot. Wine, music, dancing girls, serious poetry, free satori.” The wine and the satori — deep understanding, in the zen sense — went hand in hand. In his novel [_The Dharma Bums_](http://books.google.com/books?id=Es3fmFyTrIIC&pg=PA15&lpg=PA15&dq=%22Among+the+people+standing+in+the+audience+was+Rosie+Buchanan%22&source=bl&ots=fPITQjay14&sig=vUsfUq9Vey0VTvEcXjoRxCMTZ8s&hl=en&sa=X&ei=u6UyVPvjDa21sQT784DoAg&ved=0CCcQ6AEwAQ#v=snippet&q=Anyway%20I%20followed%20the%20whole%20gang%20of%20howling&f=false "undefined"), Jack Kerouac fictionalized the event with a description of circulating gallon jugs of California burgundy among the increasingly raucous crowd, “getting them all piffed so that by eleven o’clock when Alvah Goldbrook \[Ginsberg’s stand-in in the novel\] was reading his wailing poem ‘Wail’ \[‘Howl’\] drunk with arms outspread everybody was yelling ‘Go! Go! Go!’” Those who were there said the reading felt like a revolution — poet Michael McClure [said](http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/g%5Fl/ginsberg/performance.htm "undefined") that it pushed the art form past the “point of no return” — but critics gave the poem mixed reviews. The poet James Dickey [called it](http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/allen-ginsberg "undefined") “a whipped-up state of excitement,” but scolded that “it takes more than this to make poetry.” Poet and critic Paul Zweig was more reverential, [saying](http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/allen-ginsberg "undefined") that “Howl,” “almost singlehandedly dislocated the traditionalist poetry of the 1950s.” Government officials, meanwhile, [found it intolerably vulgar](http://www.slate.com/articles/news%5Fand%5Fpolitics/life%5Fand%5Fart/2010/09/how%5Fhowl%5Fchanged%5Fthe%5Fworld.html "undefined"). When it was published about the year after that first reading, U.S. Customs agents seized _Howl and Other Poems_ when it arrived from its London-based printer on grounds that it was indecent and obscene; San Francisco police arrested Lawrence Ferlinghetti, who published it, and Shigeyoshi Murao, manager of City Lights Books, who sold it. Mid-century America simply wasn’t ready yet for Ginsberg’s offer of free satori, it seemed. In 2007, on the 50th anniversary of the poem’s obscenity trial, Ferlinghetti told the [_New York Times_](http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/04/books/04howl.html?module=Search&mabReward=relbias%3As%2C%7B%221%22%3A%22RI%3A5%22%7D "undefined") he believed the charges were related less to the poem’s four-letter words than to the revolutionary ideas it expressed. A San Francisco judge (and Sunday school teacher) later exonerated both the men and the poem, ruling that _Howl_ had “redeeming social importance.” He may not have supported its ideas, but he was a stickler for self-expression: “Would there be any freedom of press or speech if one must reduce his vocabulary to vapid innocuous euphemism?” the _Times_ story quotes from Judge Horn’s 1957 opinion. “An author should be real in treating his subject and be allowed to express his thoughts and ideas in his own words.” Hindsight would confirm the judge’s wisdom. In 1985, TIME’s [R.Z. Sheppard noted](http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,959880,00.html "undefined") that, “the man once feared as a weevil in the nation’s moral fiber is in a disarming state of equilibrium. Cultural norms have adjusted in Ginsberg’s favor since 1956, when he disturbed the peace with _Howl._” **_Read the 1985 piece about the poet, here in TIME’s archives_**: [Mainstreaming Allen Ginsberg](http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,959880,00.html "undefined") ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3462543/howl/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3462543/howl/"},"headline":"Drunk Poetry Fans and the First Reading of 'Howl'","datePublished":"2014-10-07T16:30:36.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-21T10:35:22.965Z","description":"Oct. 7, 1955: Allen Ginsberg reads 'Howl' for the first time, at San Francisco’s Six Gallery","url":"https://time.com/3462543/howl/","keywords":["Books","History","Pop Culture","Arts","Poetry"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt035678c511c744a5/6986a729adae446a60545585/ginsberg.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jennifer Latson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/jennifer-latson/"}],"articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt035678c511c744a5/6986a729adae446a60545585/ginsberg.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Allen Ginsberg","caption":"Allen Ginsberg","creditText":"Jim Johnson—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/entertainment/","name":"Entertainment"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/books/","name":"Books"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3462543/howl/","name":"Drunk Poetry Fans and the First Reading of 'Howl'"}}]}] ```