Reality Sandwiches 1953 - 60, San Francisco 1969, The Pocket Poets Series no. eighteen, pp. 100, form. 12 x 15.5, English, booklet binding, author's dedication and handmade artwork on title page. White paint stain on the cover.
Allen Ginsberg - a legend of the American counterculture, informal leader of the Beat Generation, and above all a friend of Jack Kerouac, Neal Cassady, William S. Burroughs and Bob Dylan - is said to have always had a pen and paper on hand to write a letter at any time. This almost fanatical admirer of words and literature, a penetrating thinker and critic of America maintained a lively correspondence throughout his life, not only with family and friends, but also with writers and politicians. He reacted, debated, fell into intellectual self-indulgence, sought salvation in art and psychoanalysis. His letters are emotional, violent, juicy and filled with irony, as well as surprisingly blunt. Descriptions of New York nightlife, alcoholic and drug sessions, stays in a psychiatric hospital, homosexual adventures, artistic happenings make up a mirror in which the personal life of the sensitive poet is reflected, and show how his views on literature, philosophy, art evolved.
Reality Sandwiches is a volume of poetry by Allen Ginsberg published by City Lights Publishers in 1963. The title comes from one of the included poems, "On Burroughs' Work": "Naked lunch is natural to us, / We eat sandwiches of reality. " The book is dedicated to Beats' friend and fellow poet Gregory Corso . Despite Ginsberg's sense that this collection was not his most important, the poems still represent Ginsberg at the peak of his craft.
