Ferlinghetti, Lawrence

Ferlinghetti, Lawrence (fûr'ling-get'ē) [key], 1919–, American author and publisher, b. Yonkers, N.Y. In 1951 he moved to San Francisco and helped found the City Lights Bookshop, which became a center for writers of the beat generation. He has written volumes of colloquial verse such as A Coney Island of the Mind (1958), Starting from San Francisco (1967), and Open Eye, Open Heart (1974), as well as essays, broadsides, and the surrealist novel Her (1960). He encouraged and published many Beat writers, notably Allen Ginsberg.

The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright © 2007, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.

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