It’s Richard Brautigan’s birthday

His life was a short journey from obscurity (he never revealed much about his childhood) to counterculture fame in the 1960’s and growing literary respect, to his suicide in Bolinas in 1984 -- but his novels are still read & still funny, his poems sweetly memorable & compact, and Brautigan is revered by many writers today as an important influence.

The Brautigan site at EmpireZine has a good introductory essay by Dan Freer, an extensive list of the dates in Brautigan’s life, & a sampling of his poems under Writing. The most comprehensive online collection of Broutiganiana is at John Barber’s Brautigan Bibliography, where you’ll find everything from his life story to genealogical charts, information about his work in various literary genres, notes on the works inspired by Brautigan, eulogies & tributes to him. Don’t miss the interactive Flash version of Please Plant This Book, Brautigan’s seed packet poems. The photos of Brautigan 1963 - 1978 by Erik Weber are classics every one. And for a taste of Brautigan himself, Nils T. Devine claims to have posted “the largest collection of Richard Brautigan poetry on the Web” -- at least until Brautigan’s estate asks that the texts be taken down.

Related resources:
Our library of links to 20th century poets