http://www.northjersey.com/arts_entertainment/books/103024004_The__Beat__goes_on___Huncke_.html
September 16, 2010
BY MARK LUDAS
"It's hard to write a romantic poem when you're 50," Rick Mullin
says. "Life experience improves your writing skills but you better
have taken notes because something gets lost in the raw material. You
can't get that back again."
Mullin, a business journalist and painter who lives in Caldwell, is
the author of "Huncke," a book-length poem illustrated with 15
drawings by Montclair artist Paul Weingarten. The two will be at the
Montclair Public Library on Sept. 22 for a book talk. See info box.
Mullin's not a "fan" of the Beats, nor does he see himself as a Beat
poet. As a writer of formally versed poetry, he stands separate from
the crowd of free-verse Beatnik imitators, and is wary of the
less-than-stellar poetry that can result from unashamed imitation of
a Ginsberg or a Corso.
Even though he knew it might alienate some readers, Mullin chose to
use meter and rhyme to portray the American experience, rather than
write in the style of his subjects.
Mullin isn't boastful about this fact, but he knows he wrote a better
poem because of it.
"I'm not averse to free verse," he says, "[but] if you're going to
take something and make it rhyme, it can either be better or worse,
so go for better. It pulls you back from the initial lunge, and adds
an element of control, greatly improving the writing."
"Huncke" testifies to the enduring impact of the Beat generation.
More than writing a simple poetic biography, Mullin paints a panorama
of American history, using the picaresque story of Herbert Huncke
(rhymes with "junkie") to channel our national identity. Huncke, who
was in fact a junkie, was the inspiration for a character in Jack
Kerouac's "On the Road."
"Huncke" began as a sonnet, Mullin said, but after digging into Lord
Byron's "Don Juan" for inspiration, he realized there was an epic
quality to Huncke, and a story that went beyond the confines of its subject.
The encouraging comments from Seven Towers Publications, which
published the book, didn't hurt, either.
Mullin's original sonnet became a canto. Other cantos followed,
usually one per week. "It came when it came, in fragments, [and]
often while I was driving," Mullin said.
As the poem progressed, something became more and more evident:
"Huncke" was going to be huge.
Scenes of American history kept appearing to Mullin as objects of
further scrutiny: the Revolutionary and Civil wars, historical
atrocities, recent elections, and popular technology all came under
Mullin's lens. Humanity's destiny slowly appeared to the author as a
grim vision: "an encroachment of corporations on Western life."
But hope emerges at the very end. The youth of today will carry on
the tradition of creativity set forth by the Beat Generation.
Counterculture and dissent will survive, and humanity will be saved
as a result.
"People look at a Jackson Pollock painting, or read a poem by Gregory
Corso," Mullin said. "And it looks just splashed on there, and people
say, 'I could do that.' But it's much harder than it looks."
"Huncke" is Mullin's first long book. He describes the gratification
of "finding unintended connections as I read it now, about myself,
themes emerging as I wrote that I didn't plan."
Asked what it was like to work with Weingarten, Mullin, himself a
painter who studied at the Art Students League, said that sometimes
Weingarten's images were not what he had envisioned. Working with an
illustrator was "an opportunity for me, as a writer, to see how a
reader reacts to my work on a visual level."
Weingarten studied at New York University, the Arts Students League,
and Columbia University.
"[Paul] is an unabashed romantic," Mullin said. "He really supplies
some beautiful images that help make a rather sprawling story cohere
for the reader."
To its author, "Huncke" represents the Beat generation "writ large,"
yet he doesn't seek to make heroes of them. Huncke was a
drug-addicted hobo who lived and died penniless.
"Hero-making robs the subject of the truth about himself," Mullin
says. To make a hero of Huncke would be to deny who he really was: a
human being with the rare talent of living without restriction.
"Huncke was a great raconteur and storyteller," Mullin explains. "He
caught Ginsberg's attention by being special, someone around whom
people coalesced to create something."
And they still do.
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