Tuli Kupferberg 

For other persons named Tuli, see Tuli.
Tuli Kupferberg

Born September 28, 1923 (1923-09-28) (age 85)
New York City
Education Brooklyn College
Known for 1001 Ways to Beat the Draft
The Fugs

Tuli Kupferberg (born September 28, 1923) is an American counterculture poet, author, cartoonist, pacifist anarchist, publisher and co-founder of the band The Fugs.

Contents

Biography

A cum laude graduate of Brooklyn College in 1944, Kupferberg founded the magazine Birth in 19581. Birth ran for only three issues but published notable Beat Generation authors such as Allen Ginsberg, Diane Di Prima, LeRoi Jones, Ted Joans in the Beat circle.

Kupferberg reportedly appears in Ginsberg's poem Howl as the person "who jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge this actually happened and walked away unknown and forgotten into the ghostly daze of Chinatown". The incident in question actually occurred on the Manhattan Bridge2, and is mentioned in the prose poem "Memorial Day 1971" written by Ted Berrigan and Anne Waldman:

I asked Tuli Kupferberg once, "Did you really jump off of The Manhattan Bridge?" "Yeah," he said, "I really did." "How come?" I said. "I thought that I had lost the ability to love," Tuli said. "So, I figured I might as well be dead. So, I went one night to the top of The Manhattan Bridge, & after a few minutes, I jumped off." "That's amazing," I said. "Yeah," Tuli said, "but nothing happened. I landed in the water, & I wasn't dead. So I swam ashore, & went home, & took a bath, & went to bed. Nobody even noticed."

Kupferberg self-published the book Beatniks; or, The War Against the Beats in 1961.

In 1964, Kupferberg formed the satirical rock group The Fugs with poet Ed Sanders.3 Kupferberg took their name from Norman Mailer's substitute for the word "fuck" in his novel The Naked and the Dead. He was one of the band's singers and wrote many of their songs. He also released two solo albums: No Deposit, No Return (1966), a collection of found pop poetry, and Tuli & Friends (1989).

Perhaps his best known book is 1001 Ways to Beat the Draft (1966), a satirical collage created with Robert Bashlow. In 1961 he wrote 1001 Ways to Live Without Working, which actually contains 1005 ways to live without working, and also a number of very interesting old ads, for instance referring to raffles for slaves and unfailing ways to cure cancer and obesity. His most recent work is Teach Yourself Fucking (2000), a collection of cartoons that was published by Autonomedia.

Kupferberg is active in New York pacifist anarchist circles. He was featured in a cameo appearance in the Richard Pryor underground film Dynamite Chicken and more recently in the Jeffrey Lewis music video for Williamsburg Will Oldham Horror.4 His biweekly T.V. show Revolting News airs on Manhattan Neighborhood Network's channel 56, alternate Mondays at 10 P.M.and may be accessed by MNNs internet stream in real time http:// www.mnn.org. His YouTube channel is called "tulifuli."

Works

Published works

Songs

References

  1. ^ Sisario, Ben (2003-07-15). "Rock 'n' Roll Dissidents, Fearless for 4 Decades", New York Times. Retrieved on 8 October 2007. 
  2. ^ Holden, Stephen (1987-08-21). "POP/JAZZ; The Fugs Look Back to 1967's 'Summer of Love'", New York Times. Retrieved on 8 October 2007. ". . . Tuli Kupferberg, the poet and cartoonist whom Mr. Ginsberg remembered in Howl as the person who jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge and survived. (Mr. Ginsberg said the other day that the incident actually took place on the Manhattan Bridge in 1945.)" 
  3. ^ Strausbaugh, John (2000-09-20). "The Old Fug", New York Press. Retrieved on 8 October 2007. 
  4. ^ "Williamsburg Will Oldham Horror" (video). YouTube (2007-01-06). Retrieved on 2007-03-15.

See also

External links

Interviews


Persondata
NAME Kupferberg, Tuli
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION American anarchist, poet, publisher and musician.
DATE OF BIRTH September 28, 1923
PLACE OF BIRTH New York City, New York, United States
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH