Princess Bing Bong and The Birthday Party Blunders by Vanessa Paniccia

Just as the writings of these Beat women are palimpsests, so is Carden's work a palimpsest on top of the scholarship by the Beat scholars that came before her. This groundbreaking study meticulously and intelligently uncovers the various creative strategies women of the Beat Generation have utilized in creating identities through autobiographical literature that have liberated them from cultural 'pre-scriptions' imposed on them not only by the dominant culture but also from within the counterculture they played such a big part in creating.

In doing so, Carden demonstrates the significant role women played in this influential and dynamic literary movement. In Women Writers of the Beat Era, Mary Paniccia Carden gives voice to these female writers and demonstrates how their work redefines our understanding of ''Beat.'' The first single-authored study on female writers of this generation, the book offers vital analysis of autobiographical works by Diane di Prima, ruth weiss, Hettie Jones, Joanne Kyger, and others, introducing the reader to new voices that interact with and reconfigure the better-known narratives of the male Beat writers.

Yet left out of this picture are the Beat women, who produced a large body of writing from the 1950s through the 1970s and beyond. Burroughs's Naked Lunch, the Beat Generation defined an experimental zeitgeist that endures to today.

Starting in the 1950s with works such as Jack Kerouac's On the Road, Allen Ginsberg's Howl, and William S. The Beat Generation was a group of writers who rejected cultural standards, experimented with drugs, and celebrated sexual liberation.

Princess Bing Bong and The Birthday Party Blunders by Vanessa Paniccia