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Article: San Francisco Bookstore Is Landmark of Times Past in a City on Fast Forward; A Place Where the Beats Go On
- Article from:
- The Washington Post
- Article date:
- September 4, 2000
- Author:
CopyrightThis material is published under license from the Washington Post. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Washington Post. (Hide copyright information)
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The old poet looks from the window of his crammed bookstore and
sees little of this city's feisty counterculture on the streets
anymore. "It's getting to be the farthest thing from bohemia,"
Lawrence Ferlinghetti says.
For nearly 50 years, his creaking corner shop, City Lights, has
been an ideal place to take San Francisco's peculiar pulse. It was a
hub for Jack Kerouac and the restless rebel writers called the Beats.
It became a proving ground for free speech by selling radical works.
And it has always been a refuge for leftists, anarchists, free
spirits and literary outcasts, all howling against the establishment.
But the soul of the city is changing.
So much, in fact, that ...