Bean Spasms

by Ted Berrigan

Ted Berrigan, Joe Brainard and Ron Padgett's Bean Spasms is the defining publication of the 1960s literary/Pop scene in New York. Originally published in 1967 by Kulchur Press in an edition of 1,000, the text is comprised of collaborations between poets Ted Berrigan and Ron Padgett, with further writings, illustrations and cover by artist and writer Joe Brainard. Full of wild wit and joy in experimentation, competition and collaboration, Bean Spasms is a classic document of the New York School.

Genres: Poetry

Paperback

First published January 1, 1967

About the author

Berrigan was born in Providence, Rhode Island, on November 15, 1934. After high school, he spent a year at Providence College before joining the U.S. Army. After three years in the Army, he finished his college studies at the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma, where he received a BA in English in 1959 and fell just short of the requirements for a M.A. in 1962. Berrigan was married to Sandy Berrigan, also a poet, and they had two children, David Berrigan and Kate Berrigan. He and his second wife, the poet Alice Notley, were active in the poetry scene in Chicago for several years, then moved to New York City, where he edited various magazines and books.

A prominent figure in the second generation of the New York School of Poets, Berrigan was peer to Jim Carroll, Anselm Hollo, Alice Notley, Ron Padgett, Anne Waldman, Bernadette Mayer, and Lewis Warsh. He collaborated with Padgett and Joe Brainard on Bean Spasms, a work significant in its rejection of traditional concepts of ownership. Though Berrigan, Padgett, and Brainard all wrote individual poems for the book, and collaborated on many others, no authors were listed for individual poems.

The poet Frank O'Hara called Berrigan's most significant publication, The Sonnets, "a fact of modern poetry." A telling reflection on the era that produced it, The Sonnets beautifully weaves together traditional elements of the Shakespearean sonnet form with the disjunctive structure and cadence of T. S. Eliot's The Waste Land and Berrigan's own literary innovations and personal experiences.

Berrigan died on July 4, 1983 at the age of 49. The cause of death was cirrhosis of the liver brought on by hepatitis.

Reviews

[Jordan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Two of these three stars are for the contributions of Joe Brainard, the interview and the illustrations. The rest of the book, these collaborive Berrigan & Padgett pieces are just exhausting exercises in free-flowing nonsense. I'm not opposed to this sort of thing and there are some bright moments, but there's just an incredible density to these that makes them really impossible to really access beyond words on paper.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sadly out-of-print, if I had a book company this would be gladly in-print.

[Robert Gray · Rating 5 out of 5]

I LOVE EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS BOOK!