Janine Pommy Vega (February 5, 1942 – December 23, 2010) was an American

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...

associated with the Beats.

Early life

Janine Pommy was born in

Jersey City, New Jersey Jersey City is the List of municipalities in New Jersey, second-most populous

.Hunt, Ken (February 22, 2011)
"Obituary: Janine Pommy Vega: Beat poet and close associate of Corso, Ginsberg and Orlovsky"
''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

''. Her father worked as a milkman in the mornings and a carpenter in the afternoons.Grimes, William (January 2, 2011)
"Janine Pommy Vega, Restless Poet, Dies at 68"
''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

''. Archived fro
the original
on June 11, 2013. At the age of sixteen, inspired by

Jack Kerouac Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (; March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969), known as Jack Kerouac, was an American novelist and poet who, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, was a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Of French-Canadian ...

On the Road ''On the Road'' is a 1957 novel by American writer Jack Kerouac, based on the travels of Kerouac and his friends across the United States. It is considered a defining work of the postwar Beat and Counterculture generations, with its protagoni ...

'', she went with a friend to the

Cedar Tavern The Cedar Tavern (or Cedar Street Tavern) was a bar and restaurant at the eastern edge of Greenwich Village, New York City. In its heyday, known as a gathering place for avant garde writers and artists, it was located at 24 University Place (Manh ...

Greenwich Village Greenwich Village, or simply the Village, is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street (Manhattan), 14th Street to the north, Broadway (Manhattan), Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the s ...

, where they met

Gregory Corso Gregory Nunzio Corso (March 26, 1930 – January 17, 2001) was an American poet. Along with Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and William S. Burroughs, he was part of the Beat Generation, as well as one of its youngest members. Early life Born N ...

; in 1960, after graduating as

valedictorian Valedictorian is an academic title for the class rank, highest-performing student of a graduation, graduating class of an academic institution in the United States. The valedictorian is generally determined by an academic institution's grade poin ...

of her high school class, she moved in with

Allen Ginsberg Irwin Allen Ginsberg (; June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American poet and writer. As a student at Columbia University in the 1940s, he began friendships with Lucien Carr, William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, forming the core of th ...

and Peter Orlovsky.

Career

She worked as a waitress and wrote Beat-inspired experimental poetry. In December 1962, she married the Peruvian painter in Israel and moved with him to Paris, where she collected money for street musicians and

model A model is an informative representation of an object, person, or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin , . Models can be divided in ...

ed at the

École des Beaux-Arts ; ) refers to a number of influential art schools in France. The term is associated with the Beaux-Arts architecture, Beaux-Arts style in architecture and city planning that thrived in France and other countries during the late nineteenth centu ...

. After Vega's sudden death in

Ibiza Ibiza (; ; ; #Names and pronunciation, see below) or Iviza is a Spanish island in the Mediterranean Sea off the eastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula. It is 150 kilometres (93 miles) from the city of Valencia. It is the third largest of th ...

in 1965, she returned to the United States and moved to

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. Her first book, ''Poems to Fernando'', was published by

City Lights ''City Lights'' is a 1931 American synchronized sound film, sound romance film, romantic comedy drama, comedy-drama film written, produced, directed by, and starring Charlie Chaplin. While the film has no audible dialog, it was released with a ...

in 1968 in their City Lights Pocket Poets Series, the third volume by a woman. In the 1970s and 1980s Vega traveled widely, trekking in the Himalayas and living in Peru, Colombia, and Bolivia, including two years as a hermit on the

Isla del Sol Isla del Sol (Spanish language, Spanish for "Island of the Sun") is an island in the southern part of Lake Titicaca. It is part of Bolivia, and specifically part of the La Paz Department (Bolivia), La Paz Department. Geographically, the terrain is ...

Lake Titicaca Lake Titicaca (; ; ) is a large freshwater lake in the Andes mountains on the border of Bolivia and Peru. It is often called the highest navigable lake in the world. Titicaca is the largest lake in South America, both in terms of the volume of ...

on the Bolivian-Peruvian border, where she completed ''Journal of a Hermit'' (1974) and ''Morning Passage'' (1976). ''Tracking the Serpent: Journeys to Four Continents'' (1997) chronicles her 1980s travels to centers of ancient

matriarchy Matriarchy is a social system in which positions of Power (social and political), power and Social privilege, privilege are held by women. In a broader sense it can also extend to moral authority, social privilege, and control of property. Whil ...

. In addition to her own books of poetry, the last of which was ''The Green Piano'' (2005), Vega was widely anthologized, including in ''City Lights Pocket Poets Anthology'' and ''Women of the Beat Generation''."Janine Pommy Vega"
Teachers & Writers Collaborative. Archived fro
the original
on February 10, 2007. She also toured with a band called Tiamalu, performing in English and Spanish.

Teaching

Vega taught in schools in English and Spanish through arts in education programs including Teachers & Writers Collaborative, Poets in the Schools, Arts/Genesis, and

New York City Ballet New York City Ballet (NYCB) is a ballet company founded in 1948 by choreographer George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein. Balanchine and Jerome Robbins are considered the founding choreographers of the company. Léon Barzin was the company's fir ...

, and beginning in the mid-1970s in prisons through Incisions/Arts, becoming its director in 1987, and later through the Bard Prison Initiative run by

Bard College Bard College is a private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. The campus overlooks the Hudson River and Catskill Mountains within the Hudson River Historic District ...

. She served on the

PEN PEN may refer to: * (National Ecological Party), former name of the Brazilian political party Patriota (PATRI) * PEN International, a worldwide association of writers ** English PEN, the founding centre of PEN International ** PEN America, located ...

Prison Writing Committee.

Later life and death

From 1999, Vega lived with poet Andy Clausen. On December 23, 2010, she died at home in Willow, New York, of a heart attack.

Awards

She won two Golda Awards, the second for ''The Green Piano'', and was awarded many grants, including an annual grant from the New York State Council on the Arts for her work in prisons through Incisions/Arts.

Works

* ''Poems to Fernando'' (1968) * ''Journal of a Hermit'' (1974); repr. with ''Under The Sky'' * ''Morning Passage'' (1976) * ''Here at the Door'' (1978) * ''The Bard Owl'' (1980) * ''Skywriting'' (1988) * ''Apex of The Earth's Way'' (1984) * ''Drunk on a Glacier, Talking to Flies'' (1988) * ''Island of the Sun'' (1991) * ''Threading the Maze'' (1992) * ''Red Bracelets'' (1993) * ''Tracking the Serpent: Journeys to Four Continents'' (1997) * ''The Road to Your House Is A Mountain Road'' (1995) * ''The Walker'' (2003) * ''Mad Dogs of Trieste: New & Selected Poems'' (2000) * ''The Green Piano'' (2005)Books
''Janine Pommy Vega''. Retrieved May 23, 2022.

References

External links

WebsiteJanine Pommy-Vega (1942-2010)
cyber tombeau by poet

Pierre Joris Pierre Joris (July 14, 1946 – February 26, 2025) was a Luxembourgish- American poet, essayist, translator, and anthologist. He moved between Europe, North Africa, and the United States for fifty-five years, publishing over eighty books of poet ...

, including the opening poem of ''Poems to Fernando'' and a homage-poem by Valery Oişteanu, "The Drum Circle for Janine Pommy Vega". {{DEFAULTSORT:Pommy Vega, Janine 1942 births 2010 deaths Writers from Union City, New Jersey Beat Generation writers Modernist women writers Poets from New Jersey Poets from New York (state) American women poets 20th-century American poets 20th-century American women writers 21st-century American women