When I Was Cool by Sam Kashner (Book) 2004

Novelist and poet-at-heart Kashner has produced a kind of Almost Famous coming-of-age story both about the beginning of his life as a writer and about the end of the Beat generation of writers. As the first student in Naropa's Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poets, Kashner unwittingly walks into an environment of "crazy wisdom" (the extreme following of desires) as promulgated by Tibetan Buddhist meditation teacher Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche (as if Ginsberg and the other Beat leftovers needed a reason to explore all things sensual). A young Jewish boy without much life experience, Kashner is the perfect witness, simultaneously in awe and aghast. This memoir retraces Kashner's awakening to the very human flaws within his mentors and himself. Kashner is no Beat apostle or name-dropping "I knew them when" so-and-so. Instead, he's an honest, sensitive, and funny storyteller, a perceptive observer who sheds light and shares discovery with his readers. His memoir is about enlightenment, the kind that comes from looking back with compassion but with eyes wide open

Harper Collins
2004
Hardcover
318 pages
0060005661
Kashner, Sam
Biography
Jack Kerouac School
Poetry
First Edition
Clean tight bright copy looks barely read Dj has very minor edge wear