Ancient Acid Flashes Back: Poems [Paperback]

Adrian C. Louis (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2000 | Series: Western Literature Series

Ancient Acid Flashes Back is the true story of one who was there--and remembers--through the cloying marijuana haze, around the jagged edges of L.A. crosstops and crystal cranks, on wild windowpane trips, in the sweetness and sweat of tangled young bodies, in the stench of stale vomit and fresh garbage, in the raucous laughter of desperation and fear. In his remarkable eleventh collection, Adrian Louis beams us back to the Haight during the Summer of Love and beyond on an inimitable tour of the wild side of youth, freedom, and possibility.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Louis may be the best vernacular poet in America. He uses harsh, slangy, obscene language with unself-conscious mastery and the authenticity of coming from harsh and obscene circumstances. A self-characterized "half-breed," Louis grew up and has often lived amid the squalid poverty of Indian reservations that he has pondered in several collections, most recently in Ceremonies of the Damned (1997). His new book recalls one of his generation's defining experiences, the hippie "summer of love" and its aftermath in late-'60s San Francisco. He was there, scoring drugs and chicks, including the Chinese-American girl he fell for, who became a heroin addict well before they parted. Every punchy, profane line of these poems rings true, in the youthful idealism they recount as well as in their scary stories of street scrapes and bad trips. Louis leaves no doubt that he was in love--a goofy love, perhaps, but sensual and searing, too--and that the hippies' "illusory hope for a better world / has lasted inside him for thirty years." If you were there but can't remember the '60s,^B they come back powerfully in Louis' bitter, affectionate poems. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

From the Publisher

"Ancient Acid Flashes Back is not a random collection of poems, but a single long poem, a meditation on American history observed through the prism of a young half-breed's odyssey to the Haight in the days when it was a prime American metaphor. It is, indeed, a kind of small epic--not a song of self-indulgent complaint, but a Homeric journey downward into the roots of our national consciousness. The news Louis finds is not good, but it is bracing, and, I think, true. There is a kind of strange beauty in the rugged, unsentimental honesty of this book."--Bill Holm

"There is no border in these poems between the politics of the heart and the politics of the land. The music that fills this body of stories is direct and ancient. Still, it sounds like no one else's."--Andrei Codrescu

"I've admired the poems of Adrian C. Louis for many years. No other American poet sings better than he does. No American poet knows how to grieve or rage better than he does. Ancient Acid Flashes Back is a beautiful and terrifyingly true book."--Thomas Lux

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 88 pages
• Publisher: University of Nevada Press (September 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0874173523
• ISBN-13: 978-0874173529
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.6 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,100,886 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Stoned Haight-Ashbury Revisited, November 4, 2000

By 

Olivia Loyola (NYC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ancient Acid Flashes Back: Poems (Paperback)

An exceptional trip down the stoned, yellow-brick road of memory. I was in San Francisco in the late 1960's and these poems brought it all back--yeah, it was a real flashback. The sadness and beauty of it all. If you were there, get this book. Peace.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars very enjoyable book of poems., March 30, 2007

By 

fluffy, the human being. (forest lake, mn) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ancient Acid Flashes Back: Poems (Paperback)

this is a cycle of interrelated poems following the life and times of an amiable stoner named naatsi from his days on haight street in san francisco (circa mid-to-late 1960's) on up to south dakota and the clinton years. really these are miniature short stories, poetic vignettes that add up to a deep and satisfying portrait of an individual. nothing pretentious here at all (thank God). poetry that is enjoyable and moving, and actually about something. i highly recommend it.