Philip Lamantia (October 23, 1927 – March 7, 2005) was an American

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...

and lecturer. His poems were often

visionary A visionary, defined broadly, is one who can envision the future. For some groups, this can involve the supernatural. The visionary state is achieved via meditation, lucid dreams, daydreams, or art. One example is Hildegard of Bingen, a 12th- ...

, ecstatic, terror-filled, and erotic, exploring the subconscious world of dreams and linking it to daily experiences, while sometimes incorporating typographical arrangements a la

concrete poetry Concrete poetry is an arrangement of linguistic elements in which the typographical effect is more important in conveying meaning than verbal significance. It is sometimes referred to as visual poetry, a term that has now developed a distinct me ...

. He has posthumously been regarded as "the most visionary poet of the American

postwar In Western usage, the phrase post-war era (or postwar era) usually refers to the time since the end of World War II. More broadly, a post-war period (or postwar period) is the interval immediately following the end of a war. A post-war period ...

generation".

Biography

Lamantia was born in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

to Sicilian immigrants, and was raised in the city's

Excelsior Excelsior, a Latin comparative word often translated as "ever upward" or "even higher", may refer to: Arts and entertainment Literature and poetry * "Excelsior" (Longfellow), an 1841 poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow * ''Excelsior'' (Macedo ...

neighborhood. His poetry was first published in ''

View magazine ''VIEW'' is a free magazine located in Hamilton, Ontario Hamilton is a port city in the Canadian Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Ontario. Hamilton has a Canada 2016 Census, population of 569,353, and its Census Metropolitan ...

'' in 1943, when he was fifteen, and in the final issue of the

Surrealist Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to l ...

magazine '' VVV'' the following year. In 1944 he dropped out of Balboa High School to pursue poetry in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. He returned to the Bay Area in 1945 and his first book, ''Erotic Poems'', was published a year later. He appeared in

Maya Deren Maya Deren (born Eleonora Derenkowska, uk, Елеоно́ра Деренко́вська, links=no;

At Land ''At Land'' (1944) is a 15-minute silent experimental film written, directed by, and starring Maya Deren. It has a dream-like narrative in which a woman, played by Deren, is washed up on a beach and goes on a strange journey encountering other pe ...

(1944), a 15-minute silent experimental film. Lamantia was one of the post World War II poets now sometimes referred to as the San Francisco Renaissance, and later became involved with the San Francisco

Beat Generation The Beat Generation was a literary subculture movement started by a group of authors whose work explored and influenced American culture and politics in the post-war era. The bulk of their work was published and popularized by Silent Generatio ...

poets and the Surrealist Movement in the United States. He was on the bill at San Francisco's Six Gallery on October 7, 1955, when poet

Allen Ginsberg Irwin Allen Ginsberg (; June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American poet and writer. As a student at Columbia University in the 1940s, he began friendships with William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, forming the core of the Beat Gener ...

read his poem ''

Howl Howl most often refers to: *Howling, an animal vocalization in many canine species *Howl (poem), a 1956 poem by Allen Ginsberg Howl may also refer to: Film * ''The Howl'', a 1970 Italian film * ''Howl'' (2010 film), a 2010 American arthouse b ...

'' for the first time. At this event Lamantia chose to read the poems of John Hoffman, a friend who had recently died. Hoffman's poetry collection ''Journey to the End'' (which includes the poems that Lamantia read at the Six Gallery) was published by

City Lights Bookstore City Lights is an independent bookstore-publisher combination in San Francisco, California, that specializes in world literature, the arts, and progressive politics. It also houses the nonprofit City Lights Foundation, which publishes selected ti ...

in 2008, bound together with Lamantia's own ''Tau,'' a poem-cycle also dating from the mid-fifties. ''Tau'' remained unpublished during Lamantia's lifetime. Lamantia was also known for his journeys with native peoples in the United States and Mexico in the 1950s, participating in the peyote-eating rituals of the Washo Indians of

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. N ...

which often inspired his poems. In later life, he embraced Catholicism, the religion of his childhood, and wrote many poems on Catholic themes.

Nancy Peters Nancy Joyce Peters (born October 3, 1936) is an American publisher, writer, and co-owner with Lawrence Ferlinghetti of City Lights Books and Publishers in San Francisco until Ferlinghetti's 2021 death. Biography Nancy Peters was born in Seattle, a ...

, his wife and literary editor, said of Lamantia, "He found in the narcotic night world a kind of modern counterpart to the Gothic castle -- a zone of peril to be symbolically or existentially crossed."

Works

* ''Erotic Poems'' (Berkeley:

Bern Porter Bernard Harden Porter (born February 14, 1911, Porter Settlement in Houlton, Aroostook County, Maine – died June 7, 2004, in Belfast, Maine) was an American artist, writer, publisher, performer, and physicist. He was a representative of the avan ...

, 1946) * ''Ekstasis'' (San Francisco: Auerhahn Press, 1959) * ''Narcotica'' (San Francisco: Auerhahn Press, 1959) * ''Destroyed Works'' (San Francisco: Auerhahn Press, 1962) * ''Touch of the Marvelous'' (

o place O, or o, is the fifteenth letter and the fourth vowel letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''o'' (pronounced ), pl ...

Oyez, 1966) * ''Selected Poems 1943–1966'' (San Francisco:

City Lights Books City Lights is an independent bookstore-publisher combination in San Francisco, California, that specializes in world literature, the arts, and progressive politics. It also houses the nonprofit City Lights Foundation, which publishes selected ti ...

, 1967) *

Charles Bukowski Henry Charles Bukowski ( ; born Heinrich Karl Bukowski, ; August 16, 1920 – March 9, 1994) was a German-American poet, novelist, and short story writer. His writing was influenced by the social, cultural, and economic ambience of his adopted ...

Harold Norse Harold Norse (July 6, 1916, New York City – June 8, 2009, San Francisco) was an American writer who created a body of work using the American idiom of everyday language and images. One of the expatriate artists of the Beat generation, Norse w ...

, Philip Lamantia: ''Penguin Modern Poets'', No. 13. (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1969) * ''Blood of the Air'' (San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1970) * ''Touch of the Marvelous -- A New Edition'' (Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1974) * ''Becoming Visible'' (San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1981) * ''Meadowlark West'' (San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1986) * ''Bed of Sphinxes: New and Selected Poems, 1943–1993'' (San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1997) * ''Tau''; with ''Journey to the End'' by John Hoffman. Edited by

Garrett Caples Garrett Caples (born 1972) is an American poet and former music and arts journalist. Born in Lawrence, Massachusetts, he currently lives in San Francisco, California, after fifteen years in Oakland. An editor at City Lights Books, Caples curat ...

(San Francisco: City Lights Books, 2008) * ''The Collected Poems of Philip Lamantia.'' Edited with an introduction by

Andrew Joron Andrew Joron (born March 6, 1955) is an American writer of experimental poetry, speculative fiction, and lyrical and critical essays. He began by writing science fiction poetry. Joron's later poetry, combining scientific and philosophical ideas w ...

, and Nancy Joyce Peters (Berkeley:

University of California Press The University of California Press, otherwise known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish scholarly and scientific works by faculty ...

, 2013) * ''Preserving Fire. Selected Prose.'' Edited with an introduction by

(Seattle/New York: Wave Books, 2018) * ''Destroyed Works / Zerstörte Werke'' (German translation and afterword by Marcus Roloff, bilingual Edition. Wenzendorf: Stadtlichter Presse, 2021)

Notes

References

* Nancy Joyce Peters: ''Philip Lamantia''. In: ''Dictionary of Literary Biography'', Vol. 16, 330–336. * Steven Frattali: ''Hypodermic Light: The Poetry of Philip Lamantia and the Question of Surrealism''. Peter Lang, 2005. * Ann Charters (ed.). ''The Portable Beat Reader''. Penguin Books. New York. 1992. (hc); (pbk)

External links

*
Obituary by Christopher Lehmann-Haupt in ''The New York Times'', March 21, 2005

* ttp://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Philip-Lamantia-S-F-Surrealist-poet-2724066.php Obituary by Jesse Hamlin in the ''San Francisco Chronicle'', March 11, 2005
Guide to the Philip Lamantia Papers
at

The Bancroft Library The Bancroft Library in the center of the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, is the university's primary special-collections library. It was acquired from its founder, Hubert Howe Bancroft, in 1905, with the proviso that it retai ...

Philip Lamantia's Last Interview

,

Michael McClure Michael McClure (October 20, 1932 – May 4, 2020) was an American poet, playwright, songwriter, and novelist. After moving to San Francisco as a young man, he found fame as one of the five poets (including Allen Ginsberg) who read at the famous ...

, Lisa Jarnot,

Will Alexander (poet) Will Alexander (born 1948) is an American poet, novelist, essayist, playwright, and visual artist. He was the recipient of a Whiting Fellowship for Poetry in 2001 and a California Arts Council Fellowship in 2002. Life He earned a BA in English ...

Clark Coolidge Clark Coolidge (born February 26, 1939) is an American poet. Background As a teenager, Coolidge attended Classical High School in Providence, Rhode Island. Coolidge attended Brown University, where his father taught in the music department. After ...

, Ramson Lomatewama, John Olson (poet and writer),

Penelope Rosemont Penelope Rosemont (born 1942 in Chicago, Illinois) is a visual artist, writer, publisher, and social activist who attended Lake Forest College. She has been a participant in the Surrealist Movement since 1965. With Franklin Rosemont, Bernard Mar ...

, Donald Sidney-Fryer,

, and

Eileen Tabios Eileen Tabios (born 1960) is a Filipino-American poet, fiction writer, conceptual/visual artist, editor, anthologist, critic, and publisher. Early life Born in Ilocos Sur, Philippines, Tabios moved to the United States at the age of ten. ...

]
On Lamantia's first national publication in ''View'', June 1943

* ttp://stevenfama.blogspot.com/2011/10/viva-lamantia.html On Lamantia's shaped poem 'In a grove'
An appreciation of ''The Collected Poems of Philip Lamantia'', with two dozen individual poems discussed
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lamantia, Philip 1927 births 2005 deaths Beat Generation poets Catholics from California American poets of Italian descent American male poets Surrealist poets American Roman Catholic poets Writers from San Francisco 20th-century American poets 20th-century American male writers 20th-century American non-fiction writers American male non-fiction writers