Poet, novelist, critic, Lawrence Lipton is best known for The Holy Barbarians (1959), a sociological analysis of the Beats: their way of life, attitudes, cultural achievements, and role in society, with biographical sketches of some well-known Beat Generation personalities. William Hogan of the San Francisco Chronicle, in the process of reviewing the book, describes the cast of characters as being "as bizarre as that in Nathanael West's The Day of the Locust. In its gothic way, this book is just about as fascinating."

Lawrence Lipton was born in Lodz, Poland, and brought to America in 1903 by his father, Abraham Lipton, who had saved enough money to send for his wife, Rose, and their three small children. At the turn of the century, the customary method of travel for the thousands of immigrants who came to this country was via steerage and railroad, which meant sitting in a coach for...