Challenging the Modernity of American Culture The Howl by...

In the poem Howl, Allen Ginsberg challenges the modernity of American culture, which enforces the â€Å"best minds† (1) to give up their freedom to conform to the desired sense of normality. Ginsberg states â€Å"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked/ dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix† (9). His expression of Moloch The angry fix is what all of these â€Å"best minds† look for after being stripped of their freedom to conform to the new American culture after World War II. The form of Ginsberg’s poem challenges the American culture by resistance from â€Å"best minds†. Howl is separated to three sections that include long lines, which look like paragraphs. Resisting†¦show more content†¦Ginsberg reflects on the satire of people worshipping American culture when it is actually the cause of their trouble. Which glorifies a civilization restricting you to normality, and destroying the best minds. These parts take the reader behind Ginsberg’s belief of the â€Å"best minds† American culture changes across the fundamental desires to destroy them. â€Å"Moloch! Solitude! Filth! Ugliness! Ashcans and unobtainable dollars! Children screaming under the stairways! Boys sobbing in armies! Old men weeping in the parks! Moloch! Moloch! Nightmare of Moloch! Moloch the loveless! Mental Moloch! Moloch the heavy judger of men!† (21) Ginsberg expresses what Moloch means to him. The â€Å"best minds† are exposed to the unpleasant feeling of being remote from society if they did not follow their callings. Those callings create solitude of man from one another and the world as a whole. Members of the American society sacrifice their time and emotions for an unobtainable wealth they can never receive. Ginsberg reflects on poverty of the time the â€Å"best minds† were living in which left the children homeless and on the streets. Ginsberg expresses American society taking the young people and making them go mad by stating that boys were in armies and old men in parks. Moloch creates the filth and ugliness the â€Å"best minds† are forced to live in if they do not conform to the ideals of the modern society they