Allen Ginsberg, Irving Rosenthal, Peter Orlovsky, Chicago, at the time of Big Table Magazine benefit reading, featuring Peter Orlovsky, Gregory Corso and Allen, January 1959. Irving Rosenthal passed away last weekend at the age of 91.
Irving Rosenthal along with Paul Carroll, founded the hugely consequential, but short lived Big Table Magazine after running afoul of the University of Chicago for publishing excerpts of William Burroughs' Naked Lunch in the Chicago Review Summer 58 issue. The first issue, published March 1959, edited by Rosenthal, was seized by authorities for obscenity, with the decision ultimately reversed by none other than Judge Julius Hoffman who conducted the Chicago 7 trial nearly ten years later. The benefit reading was released on Fantasy Records and is still available as Howls Raps and Roars, and Howl & Other Poems (photos courtesy Stanford University Libraries / Allen Ginsberg Estate)
















