Bruce Fessier
August 30, 2009
Sixties icon Paul Krassner hasn't taken a hallucinogenic drug in a decade.
At 77, the high priest and chronicler of the American counter-culture
just doesn't have time for day tripping.
His office in his Desert Hot Springs home is cluttered with books he
hasn't had time to read. He keeps a handwritten schedule on the wall
that dictates his septuagenarian lifestyle:
Read newspapers and mail at 6 a.m.
Exercise from 8 to 9 a.m.
Write from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Sleep from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m., per chance to dream.
There are pieces of memorabilia reflecting his place in history. A
program from his violin recital at Carnegie Hall when he was 6 years
old is framed on a bathroom wall. He was reportedly the youngest
performer in Carnegie history, but when the laughter he inadvertently
evoked thrilled him more than the applause, his career was cast as
the iconoclastic humorist he is today.
For the past 56 years, Krassner has been a journalist who has
occasionally crossed the line into the realm of social activism as a
co-founder of the Yippies and member of the San Francisco-based Merry
Pranksters.
A painting in his office tells how that's worked out. It's a portrait
of a clown behind bars with a sign around his neck that says, "Incorrigible."
Inspired by Mad magazine, Krassner started the first adult satirical
magazine, The Realist, in 1958. "Tonight Show" host Steve Allen was
its first subscriber. Lenny Bruce, a pioneer of modern stand-up
comedy, received a gift subscription to The Realist from Allen and
became friends with Krassner, who then edited Bruce's autobiography.
Bruce was charged with obscenity for reading The Realist during his
stand-up act.
Today, Krassner's ruminations about obscenity have resulted in a new
book titled "Who's To Say What's Obscene?" He'll sign copies of it
and participate in a question- and-answer session Saturday at Borders
Bookstore at The River in Rancho Mirage.
"Obscenity, whether it's language or pornography, has entered
mainstream acceptance," Krassner says in his living room with his
wife, Nancy. "The meaning of the word has morphed into an adjective
for these things that are truly obscene because they are harmful to people."
Krassner doesn't drink alcohol or coffee, and he boasts he's never
taken a legal (i.e., prescription) drug.
But, even though his psychedelic days may be behind him, Krassner is
still capable of what seems like a perfectly straight "stoned rap."
Answers to questions flow seamlessly from unattached thoughts into
new ideas. Out of the start of chaotic sentences come the order of
cohesive paragraphs.
His wife serves an all-American bowl of cherries as Krassner ponders
such questions as:
Beatnik or hippie?: "I'm a tweenie! (born after most of the beats but
before most of the hippies). I started The Realist in '58 and (Jack
Kerouac's) "On the Road" came out in 1957. I spoke at some place and
met (poet) Gregory Corso and I met (poet) Allen Ginsberg in the
Village. So, I was aware of the beat generation and liked it because
it wasn't taking mainstream culture for granted. In the first issue
of The Realist, I published a takeoff of Kerouac's "On the Road." It
was a message to myself to be prepared to make fun of anything I
identified with to remain independent."
His reputation as "father of the underground press": "Underground is
a misnomer because (The Realist) was sold openly and people knew
where they could get more copies. Other people named it the
underground press as other papers followed it. I never called it
counterculture. The word wasn't invented! But, when People magazine
called me the father of the underground press, that made it official."
Turning on to marijuana at age 33: "I published stuff why it should
not be a crime before I ever tried it. John Wilcock, (a) founder of
the Village Voice, and I went to an off-Broadway play. During
intermission, he smoked a joint. He didn't like the first act, but he
loved the second act, which I was bored by, and I thought, 'Oh, I
don't want it to affect my critical judgment.' So I postponed. But
people kept offering and it didn't really (do anything). It wasn't
until I came to a Vietnam Day Teach-In, outdoors on the (UC) Berkeley
campus, and Stew Albert, who later became one of the founding
Yippies, gave me a Thai stick. I took a toke and it was a little jump
in my development.
(3 of 3)
"I had taken acid before I smoked, and when I told my mother I had
taken LSD, she was concerned because she said, 'It could lead to
marijuana.' And she was right."
The leader of the '60s San Francisco counterculture: Grateful Dead
guitarist Jerry Garcia or "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" author
Ken Kesey: "The Dead provided the soundtrack, but Kesey organized the
events they would play at free. So, they needed each other. (A
performance by) The Dead was not just a concert. It was a camp
reunion or a healing ceremony or a lot of stuff besides the music.
Kesey couldn't have done it without the music."
Counterculture groups and their leaders: "It was known as Ken Kesey
and His Merry Band of Pranksters. The Hog Farm was Wavy Gravy. The
Farm, which was one of the biggest communes that linked from San
Francisco to Tennessee, was Stephen Gaskin. But, ultimately, other
people take over. It's like Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin are thought
of as co-founders (of the Yippies) and now that they're dead, I'm
suddenly a co-founder with them. There were plenty of other people
involved, but we were the main people who were the liaisons to the media.
"Charles Manson was a leader of that particular family, and other
Pranksters and I talked about how Kesey and Manson were very
charming, and it was a good thing for them they went after Kesey
rather than after Manson."
Switching from the Yippies to Kesey's Pranksters after the 1968
Chicago Democratic National Convention and Woodstock: "We had known
of each others' work. He told me when I published 'The Parts Left Out
of the Kennedy Book' (basically accusing Lyndon Johnson of
necrophilia after becoming president) they were on the bus and (Neal)
Cassady handed it to him and said, 'Hey, Chief, you've got to take a
look at this!' Because it was the most scandalous, notorious thing of 1967.
"Then, in 1970, I got a call from (publisher) Stewart Brand. He had
asked Kesey to edit the last supplement to 'The Whole Earth Catalog'
and Kesey said he would do it if I would do it with him. So I moved
to San Francisco in February '71. Just spending a couple of months
every day on this project, and then spending time later, it was like
meeting a fellow Martian, but a Martian who was a leader."
On his philosophy that "God is totally neutral": "I kind of kept
quiet about it (in the 1950s) because it was bad enough that I got
beaten up for being Jewish when I didn't consider myself Jewish. It
was a don't ask-don't tell type of thing until (recalling) a history
teacher in my first semester at college. He later became a subscriber
to The Realist and he would go off on little tangents. He said, 'If
horses had religion, their god would look like a horse.' It was a
simple thing, but it was like a ray of light to me. That was the
first thing that ultimately evolved into Barrack Obama at his
inauguration acknowledging nonbelievers."
"I had taken acid before I smoked, and when I told my mother I had
taken LSD, she was concerned because she said, 'It could lead to
marijuana.' And she was right."
The leader of the '60s San Francisco counterculture: Grateful Dead
guitarist Jerry Garcia or "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" author
Ken Kesey: "The Dead provided the soundtrack, but Kesey organized the
events they would play at free. So, they needed each other. (A
performance by) The Dead was not just a concert. It was a camp
reunion or a healing ceremony or a lot of stuff besides the music.
Kesey couldn't have done it without the music."
Counterculture groups and their leaders: "It was known as Ken Kesey
and His Merry Band of Pranksters. The Hog Farm was Wavy Gravy. The
Farm, which was one of the biggest communes that linked from San
Francisco to Tennessee, was Stephen Gaskin. But, ultimately, other
people take over. It's like Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin are thought
of as co-founders (of the Yippies) and now that they're dead, I'm
suddenly a co-founder with them. There were plenty of other people
involved, but we were the main people who were the liaisons to the media.
"Charles Manson was a leader of that particular family, and other
Pranksters and I talked about how Kesey and Manson were very
charming, and it was a good thing for them they went after Kesey
rather than after Manson."
Switching from the Yippies to Kesey's Pranksters after the 1968
Chicago Democratic National Convention and Woodstock: "We had known
of each others' work. He told me when I published 'The Parts Left Out
of the Kennedy Book' (basically accusing Lyndon Johnson of
necrophilia after becoming president) they were on the bus and (Neal)
Cassady handed it to him and said, 'Hey, Chief, you've got to take a
look at this!' Because it was the most scandalous, notorious thing of 1967.
"Then, in 1970, I got a call from (publisher) Stewart Brand. He had
asked Kesey to edit the last supplement to 'The Whole Earth Catalog'
and Kesey said he would do it if I would do it with him. So I moved
to San Francisco in February '71. Just spending a couple of months
every day on this project, and then spending time later, it was like
meeting a fellow Martian, but a Martian who was a leader."
On his philosophy that "God is totally neutral": "I kind of kept
quiet about it (in the 1950s) because it was bad enough that I got
beaten up for being Jewish when I didn't consider myself Jewish. It
was a don't ask-don't tell type of thing until (recalling) a history
teacher in my first semester at college. He later became a subscriber
to The Realist and he would go off on little tangents. He said, 'If
horses had religion, their god would look like a horse.' It was a
simple thing, but it was like a ray of light to me. That was the
first thing that ultimately evolved into Barrack Obama at his
inauguration acknowledging nonbelievers."
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