Post Modernism: Beat Generation
What common qualities do the "Beats" share? Why were they so named ? Beat poetry emerged from the disillusionment that followed World War II, a period of unimaginable atrocities including the Holocaust and the dropping of the atomic bomb over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and August 9, 1945 respectively. Science had militarially progressed mankind to the brink whereby millions could be killed instantly . Following the end of World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union quickly entered a Cold War, a period of political hostility that created paranoia and cultural and political repression. By the 1950’s a new generation of American writers , many U niversity educated from upper middle-class, rebelled against societal norms of American culture built on cap i t a lism and materialism. T hey were mainly a boys ...