Date of Birth: August 17, 1939
Place of Birth: Kansas City, Missouri
In the extra chapter "A Book of Verse", appended to the 1990 re-issue of Ed Sanders' satiric memoir "Tales of Beatnik Glory", Sanders recounts the experience of discovering Allen Ginsberg's "Howl and Other Poems" as a teenage boy in 1957. Refering to himself in the third person, he says of the days following: "When he returned to school the next day he was a changed person. 'Holy holy holy holy holy holy', he must have chanted that word, in long continuous singsong sentences, at least four or five thousand times a day. He felt great. Every care assumed before evaporated. He read the poem to anybody who would listen and got into trouble almost immediately." School officials' admonitions to stay away from such "despicable ravings of a homo" were ignored, and before the year was up he'd be suspended for refusing to stop bringing "filth" onto school property.
Ginsberg's work, then, had a profound impact on the young seventeen year-old, showing him that he had more options than those carefully laid before him by his family: go to law school like his uncle Milton, or work in his father's dry goods store. After graduating from high school, he and a friend "got really loaded and then said goodbye. 'I'm going to New York to become a poet.' "
Sanders founded the Fugs in 1964 with Tuli Kupferberg. Their music was a literate-tone folk/rock: they "chanted poetry, wrote songs and did a lot of partying" (the name came from the "fornicatory euphemism Norman Mailer had utilized in his novel, "The Naked and the Dead"). They created the Fugs because it was "better than working or graduate school, and it gave us a modest hope of earning our livelihood from art."
Among his other ventures in the 60's were the Peace Eye Bookstore on East 10th Street in Manhattan, and a journal called "Fuck You: A Magazine of the Arts." More recently, he presented his "Amazing Grace" project at St. Mark's Church in the East Village; this involved many poets, singers and other creative people contributing verses to the old gospel song. He lives in Woodstock, New York, where he publishes The Woodstock Journal, a community newspaper with poetry and art.
Here's an interesting recent interview with Ed Sanders that appeared in BEAT SCENE.
Poem From Jail
(1963)
Peace Eye
(1966)
The Family: The Manson Group and Aftermath
(1970, New Edition 1990)
Shards of God : a novel of the Yippies
(1970)
Egyptian Heiroglyphics
(1973)
Tales of Beatnik Glory, Volume 1
(1975)
Investigative Poetry
(1976)
20,000 A.D.
(1976)
Fame & Love in New York
(1980)
The Z-D Generation
(1981)
The Cutting Prow
(1983)
Hymn to Maple Syrup & Other Poems
(1985)
Thirsting for Peace in a Raging Century: Selected Poems 1961-1985
(1987)
Poems for Robin
(1987)
Tales of Beatnik Glory, Volumes 1 & 2
(1990)
Hymn to the Rebel Cafe
(1993)
(Thanks to Ross Hulvey (RHulvey@aol.com) for putting together this discography)
The Village Fugs
(lp, Broadside [Folkways] Records, 304, 1965)
First Fugs Album
[re-issue of above, often thought to be THE first Fugs album]
(lp, ESP Records, ESP-1018, 1965)
(lp, Base Record, ESP-1018, nd)
The Fugs
[liner notes by Allen Ginsberg]
(lp, ESP Records, ESP-1028, 1966)
(lp, Base Record, ESP-1028, nd)
The Fugs Second Album
[re-issue of above, with additional tracks]
(cd, Fugs Records, 1993)
The ESP Sampler
[Fugs, Holy Modal Rounders, et al]
(lp, ESP Records, ESP-1051, nd)
Tenderness Junction
[guests: Allen Ginsberg & Gregory Corso]
(lp, Reprise Records, RS6289, 1968)
Virgin Fugs
(lp, ESP Records, ESP-1038, 1968)
(lp, Base Record, ESP-1038, nd)
It Crawled Into My Hand, Honest
(lp, Reprise Records, 1969)
(lp, Edsel Records, XED 181, 1986)
The Belle of Avenue A
(lp, Reprise Records, RS6359, 1969)
Golden Filth
[subtitled "Alive at the Filmore East"]
(lp, Reprise Records, RS6396, 1970)
Fugs 4, Rounders Score
[Fugs and Holy Modal Rounders]
(lp, ESP Records, ESP-2018, 1975)
Big Ego
[Fugs do "A Monologue", with tracks by other performers]
(lp, Dial-a-Poem, 1978)
Proto-Punk
[subtitled "The Fugs Greatest Hits, Vol. 1]
(lp, Adelphi Records, 1982)
(lp, PVC Records, 1983)
Refuse to be Burnt-Out
(lp, New Rose Records, ROSE 56, 1984)
(lp, Olufsen Records, DOC 5006, 1984)
Baskets of Love
(lp, Olufsen Records, DOC 5009, 1985)
No More Slavery
(lp, Olufsen Records, DOC 5001, 1986)
Star Peace
(2 lps, New Rose Records, ROSE 115, 1987)
Fugs Live in Woodstock
(cd, Musik/Musik, 1989)
Real Woodstock Festival
[should be released by now, but haven't seen it yet]
(2 cds, Ace Records, 1995)
Sanders' Truckstop
(lp, Reprise Records)
Beer Cans on the Moon
(lp, Reprise Records)
The Dial-a-Poem Poets
[Ed reads "Cemetary Hill"]
(lp, Dial-a-Poem, 1972)
Disconnected
[Ed reads "Stand by My Side, Oh Lord"]
(lp, Dial-a-Poem, 1974)
Biting Off the Tongue of a Corpse
[Ed reads "The Struggle"]
(lp, Dial-a-Poem, 1975)
Totally Corrupt
[Ed reads "This is the Age of Investigation Poetry
and Every Citizen Must Investigate"]
(lp, Dial-a-Poem, 1976)
One World Poetry: Live from Amsterdam
[Ed reads "Ban the Bomb (No Neutron Bomb),"
also readings from Burroughs, di Prima, etc.]
(2-lps, Milkway Records, 1981)
Songs in Ancient Greek
(cd, Olufsen Records, 1989)
The Best of Sanders
(cass., Ed Sanders, 1992)
Poetry in Motion
[Ed & others]
(cd-rom, Voyager Co., QT 11, 1994)
No Deposit, No Return
(lp, ESP Records, ESP-1035)
(cd, re-issue [not confirmed])
Tuli and Friends
(lp, Shimmy Disc SHIMMY 020, 1989)
Rutles Highway Revisited
[Tuli does "Living in Hope." Also,
tracks by Peter Stampfel, et al]
(cd, Shimmy Disc, SDE 9028/CD, nd)
Literary Kicks
Contributed by Hewitt Pratt = hewitt@well.com
Discography by Ross Hulvey = RHulvey@aol.com