Beat generation

Beat generation, U.S. literary movement of the 1950s, exemplified by Jack Kerouac's On the Road (1956), the adventures of the original social dropout, Allen Ginsberg's long poem Howl, and work by such poets as Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Gregory Corso, and by novelist William S. Burroughs. The movement, a protest against complacent middle-class values, was short-lived, but influenced artistic experiments for the next 15 years.

See also: Kerouac, Jack.