The Village Beat Scene: Summer 1960

This essay is both more and less than a portrayal of the beats of Greenwich Village and its environs. More, because much of it holds good for beats elsewhere. Less, because I have not depicted some of the Village beat world’s well-publicized aspects, but have tried for completeness only in regard to the changes that have taken place in that world since my last acquaintance with it (1957). I use the word “beat” for brevity and ask readers to note that it obscures as much as it illuminates.

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The individuals in question resent any label whatever, and regard a concern with labelling as basically square. But insofar as they speak of themselves generically and are forced to choose among evils, they prefer the word “beat.” Until recently “hipster” meant simply one who is hip, roughly the equivalent of a beat. Beats recognized that the hipster is more of an “operator”—has a more consciously patterned lifestyle (such as a concern to dress well) and makes more frequent economic raids on the frontiers of the square world—but stressed their social bonds with hipsters, such as their liking for drugs, for jazz music, and, above all, their common scorn ...