The Beat avant-garde, the 1950s, and the popularizing of Zen Buddhism in the United States (Jack Kerouac, Joanne Kyger, Gary Snyder, Philip Whalen)

Connections between Zen and writers associated with the Beat movement have been evident to critics and public alike ever since Jack Kerouac's publication of The Dharma Bums in 1958. This synergy between the two would be continuous over the remainder of the 1950's, one seeming to imply or be synonymous with the other. This dissertation looks at how these writers use Zen philosophy and aesthetics as avant-garde discourse to position themselves as radical other in relation to the literary establishment and the conformity of the 1950's. Through a close reading of the work of Jack Kerouac, Joanne Kyger, Gary Snyder, and Philip Whalen, I demonstrate how an understanding of Zen contributes to writing practice, subject matter, and literary innovations during the 1950's and early 1960's.; The increasing popularity of Zen at this time, disseminated primarily through magazine culture's sensationalization of the Beat avant-garde, affects American culture as a whole. Characterizations of Zen for the West enable it to act as cultural force even for those not directly involved in it as religious practice. My project is thus a model for understanding how a traditional religion intersects with popular culture in the United States through the vehicle of an avant-garde literary movement. In addition, the fascination with Zen, as part of an interest in bridging the gap between East and West, has much to do with American attitudes toward Japan, thus providing another angle through which to view American culture in the aftermath of World War II.; A critical reading of discourse of and about Zen and its Americanization going back to the aesthetically and spiritually oriented Japan Craze of the 1890's provides a context for a discussion of Zen influences in the 1950's. At both times, Zen was understood more as an aesthetic and cultural phenomenon than a religious one, its practice considered to be as much artistic and psychological as monastic and meditative, what I have characterized as the dual discourse of Zen. Interestingly, the writers associated with the Beat avant-garde have much to do with moving the discourse of Zen in a more spiritual direction.