The Pittsburgh Quarterly announces that Bruce Hoffman is the new editor of TPQ On-Line our Internet magazine. I will continue as Editor-in-chief. We're now setting up residence for the on-line pages at Pittsburgh Free Net. Entry point to the on-line magazine is live on this site homepage.

Bruce and I have a long history of working together. He edited our union publication for which I wrote for a number of years. We jammed on the stage at Wobblie Joe's. He's served as a member of our board since we incorporated. He's always been a reliable, creative and diligent writer and friend. I look forward to his increased participation in the activities of TPQ.

In Memory of Allen Ginsberg


June 3, 1926 - April 5, 1997

I recall the majesty of each time I went to audience Allen Ginsberg -- once on the Boston Common where the Summer of Love was hardly in the ground, in fact it might not have been the great man at all that year -- such is memory. Now that I ponder I realize I'm transposing the singularly similar events of 1967: once, here in Pittsburgh in the Spring he was performing in a lecture series at the Chatham College Chapel. People such as he and Kurt Vonnegut - popular and also academically acclaimed writers were brought in. The evening opened like a night on Bald Mountain, with the wind rising as we walked the several miles from Oakland to Shadyside.The thunder outside was a foreign element after the poet took the center stage. Of course, no stage but, appropriately, a sacred place. In April of 1967 I went to work in Boston and the first day in Cambridge in the mid-afternoon the wind began to blow and the lightning and snow in the mid-afternoon. . .Allen Ginsberg was visiting Boston.

He really had his Ivy League moments, also, in spite of the image he projected time and again of the mystic. And then, in the style of the barrelhouse entertainer he would raise the crowd up with his thumb piano or his unaccompanied chant. Pittsburgh had to be one of his favorite towns. He was an accomplished musician, used the accordion, was the reincarnation of William Blake, called down the lightning and now retires under a blanket of snow. What unmarked page waits for the telling? He was a gentleman who was driven in his art. We continue the song of the blues even in celebration.

Photo by Lawrence Correnti


The Pittsburgh Quarterly is not in current print publication. Board of Directors: Frank Correnti, Peter Mark, Lyn Ferlo, James Deahl, Ellen Smith, Bruce Hoffman, John Schulman, Michael Wurster, Rob Penny (in memoriam), and J. Michael Milberger.


We welcome submissions of art work, particularly electronic art work, and photographs. Submissions by US mail must be accompanied by SASE. Reporting period approximately four months. Canadian writers may submit to 237 Prospect Street South, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada L8M 2Z6. We welcome submissions by e-mail. (See our Area Poets & Writers Directory or other e-mail links for Mr. Correnti, Mr. Hoffman, or Ms. Ferlo.) We ask that you advise us of any prior publication. All rights revert to author upon publication. We ask that you acknowledge TPQ in future publication.

. . . . .Frank Correnti, Editor, TPQ

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