Gary Snyder ’51, Pulitzer-Prize winning poet (and keynote speaker for Centennial Reunions ’11!), is profiled in a new film, “The Practice of the Wild.” The documentary, which premiered at the San Francisco International Film Festival, “revolves around a life-long conversation between Snyder and his fellow poet and novelist Jim Harrison.” (San Simeon Films)
“Together, the two old friends roam the verdant hills of the central California coast, musing eloquently and with hard-won wisdom and earthy humor on Bay Area bohemia, Zen Buddhism and the morally charged interdependence of all living things.” (Steven Jenkins, San Francisco Film Society) Watch the trailer for the film.
If you crave more bang for your Beat, read the feature story “When the Beats Came Back” in Reed magazine (winter 2008) about a 1956 road trip by Snyder and Allen Ginsberg that brought “Howl” to Reed (listen to Gary reading assorted poetry on that visit). Also, check out a photography exhibit, “Beat Memories: The Photographs of Allen Ginsberg,” at the National Gallery (the show has closed, but the website offers highlights). Edmund White’s fascinating review of the exhibit, with rich contextual anecdotes, ran in the New York Review of Books.