SOURCE: Podhoretz, Norman. “My War with Allen Ginsberg.” Commentary 104, no. 2 (August 1997): 27-40.

In the following essay, Podhoretz recalls his disputes with Ginsberg and provides a critical assessment of his work and contribution to American poetry.

“Allen Ginsberg, Master Poet of Beat Generation, Dies at 70,” proclaimed the headline on the front page of the New York Times for April 6, 1997. Reading it, I was moved more deeply than I would have expected—not to grief (though an unmistakable touch of sadness did briefly make a surprise appearance) but rather to an overwhelming feeling of wistfulness. It came over me that I had known this man for a full 50 years—50 years!—and that for at least 40 of them I had been at war with him and he with me. It came over me too that even now, with Ginsberg himself carried off the field, his work and its influence would still...