Lewis MacAdams
Encyclopedia
Lewis MacAdams is an American poet, journalist
, political activist, and filmmaker who lives in Los Angeles, California
.
and graduated from Princeton University
in 1966. He is the author of a dozen books and tapes of poetry, and his poems have appeared in many anthologies. In 2001, he published his Birth of The Cool, a cultural history of the idea of cool.
As a journalist, MacAdams has been a contributing editor of the L.A. Weekly and has written regularly on culture and ecology for Rolling Stone, Men’s Journal, L.A. Times, and Los Angeles Magazine.
As a political activist, MacAdams is a cofounder of Friends of The Los Angeles River (FoLAR) established in 1985 (and has served as Chair on their Board of Directors). FoLAR has been characterized by MacAdams as a "40 year art work" to bring the Los Angeles River back to life. In the years since, he has become the River’s most important and influential advocate. Among FoLAR’s many projects are an annual river clean-up, the "Gran Limpieza," which brings 2500 people down to the river to clean up every Spring; and an on-going series of conferences and planning workshops dealing with every aspect of the river. Two of its current major goals are to create a Los Angeles River Conservancy to oversee restoration of the river, and a River Watch program to improve the River’s water quality and target polluters
In 1991, MacAdams received the San Fernando Valley Audubon Society’s annual Conservation Award. The River: Books One, Two & Three, takes the Los Angeles River as its metaphor, weaving the story and song of the poet, activist and journalist as these three roles form the confluence which is the man.
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
, political activist, and filmmaker who lives in Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
.
Life and work
MacAdams was born in San Angelo, TexasSan Angelo, Texas
San Angelo is a city in the state of Texas. Located in West Central Texas it is the county seat of Tom Green County. As of 2010 according to the United States Census Bureau, the city had a total population of 93,200...
and graduated from Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
in 1966. He is the author of a dozen books and tapes of poetry, and his poems have appeared in many anthologies. In 2001, he published his Birth of The Cool, a cultural history of the idea of cool.
As a journalist, MacAdams has been a contributing editor of the L.A. Weekly and has written regularly on culture and ecology for Rolling Stone, Men’s Journal, L.A. Times, and Los Angeles Magazine.
As a political activist, MacAdams is a cofounder of Friends of The Los Angeles River (FoLAR) established in 1985 (and has served as Chair on their Board of Directors). FoLAR has been characterized by MacAdams as a "40 year art work" to bring the Los Angeles River back to life. In the years since, he has become the River’s most important and influential advocate. Among FoLAR’s many projects are an annual river clean-up, the "Gran Limpieza," which brings 2500 people down to the river to clean up every Spring; and an on-going series of conferences and planning workshops dealing with every aspect of the river. Two of its current major goals are to create a Los Angeles River Conservancy to oversee restoration of the river, and a River Watch program to improve the River’s water quality and target polluters
In 1991, MacAdams received the San Fernando Valley Audubon Society’s annual Conservation Award. The River: Books One, Two & Three, takes the Los Angeles River as its metaphor, weaving the story and song of the poet, activist and journalist as these three roles form the confluence which is the man.
Books
- City Money: Poems. Burning Water (1966)
- City Room
- The Poetry Room. New York: Harper & Row; First Edition edition (January 1, 1970)
- A Bolinas Report
- Tilth
- Dance, pamphlet. Canton: The Institute of Further Studies; first edition (January 1, 1972)
- News From Niman Farm, Tombouctou Books, 1976; first edition (November 1976)
- Live At The Church. Kulchur Foundation (1977)
- Blind Date, pamphlet. Am Here Books/Immediate Editions; first edition (January 1, 1981)
- The Angel (with Rita Degli Esposti & Gianantonio Pozzi)
- Africa and The Marriage of Walt Whitman and Marilyn Monroe. Little Caesar Press (1982)
- The River, Books One & Two. Palo Alto, CA: Blue Press, 1998
- Birth of the Cool: Beat, Bebop, and the American Avant-Garde. New York: The Free Press, 2001
- The Family Trees, (illustrated by Kim Abeles). Palo Alto, CA: Blue Press, 2001
- A Poem for the Dawn of the Terror Years. Palo Alto, CA: Blue Press, 2003
- The River: Books One, Two, and Three. Palo Alto, CA: Blue Press, revised second edition, 2007
- Lyrics. Palo Alto, CA: Blue Press, 2009
- Dear Oxygen. New Orleans, LA: University of New Orleans Press, 2011
Articles
- “Poetry and Politics.” Talking poetics from Naropa Institute : annals of the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics V. 2. Ed. Anne Waldman and Marilyn Webb, Boulder, Colo. : Shambhala, 1979
- Remembering Jim Carroll. Los Angeles Times. 16 September 2009.
External links
- Q: What do I love about Philip Whalen's poems? written for the L.A. Weekly on the occasion of the publication of Philip WhalenPhilip WhalenPhilip Glenn Whalen was an American poet, Zen Buddhist, and a key figure in the San Francisco Renaissance and close to the Beat generation.-Biography:...
’s Overtime, March, 1999 - Interview with Lewis MacAdams subtitled: Birth of the Cool. Beat, Bebop and the American Avant-Garde. MacAdams is interviewed by Paul DeRienzo
- Grand Central Station a chapbook of poems by MacAdams featured at Big Bridge#9
- Friends of the Los Angeles River main website
- Dale Smith reviews Lewis MacAdams
- Orhan Pamuk's L.A. stroll conjures up familiar sights MacAdams article, which first appeared November 2009 in the L.A. Times, discusses the Nobel prize-winning author Orhan PamukOrhan PamukFerit Orhan Pamuk , generally known simply as Orhan Pamuk, is a Turkish novelist. He is also the Robert Yik-Fong Tam Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University, where he teaches comparative literature and writing....
, and his bond with Los Angeles' old-fashioned urban scape. - KCET Departures interview with Lewis Macadams artist and advocate of the L.A. River