Moving Through Here : Don McNeill 1970 [ Village Voice , Peter Max ]

Description

First Edition of Moving Through Here, The Collected Writings Of Ill-Fated 1960s Chronicler and Village Voice journalist Don McNeill

McNeill, Don. Moving Through Here. Alfred A Knopf. New York. 1970. First Edition.

 

Posthumously published collection of articles and essays from The Village Voice written by journalist Don McNeill, noted eyewitness, participant, and chronicler of much of the early 1960s counterculture movement in New York City with attention paid to hippies, yippies, diggers, Hare Krishnas, and contemporary anti-Vietnam War efforts. Includes a forward by Beat poet Allen Ginsburg with a cover designed by hippie pop artist Peter Max.

Born in Nazi Germany in 1937, Max emigrated with his parents to Shanghai, China, spending 10 years there before moving to Israel by way of Tibet in 1948 before moving to Paris and finally Brooklyn by 1953. His early exposure to Buddhism as well as the art training he received in Israel and Europe ahead of attending the Art Students League of New York perfectly prepared him for entry into the anti-War hippie scene of the 1960s, designing the poster for the second ever “Be In” gathering in Central Park over Easter Weekend 1967, the story of which served as the inspiration for the musical and movie Hair, and which Don McNeill also covered for The Village Voice.

As McNeill described the Central Park Be In in his coverage, reprinted in Moving Through Here:

Bonfires burned on the hills, their smoke mixing with bright balloons among the barren trees and high, high above kites wafted in the air. Rhythms and music and mantras from all corners of the meadow echoed in exquisite harmony, and thousands of lovers vibrated into the night. It was miraculous.

It was a feast for the senses; the beauty of the colors, clothes, and shrines, the sounds and the rhythms, at once familiar, the smell of flowers and frankincense, the taste of jellybeans. But the spirit of the Be-In was tuned — in time — to past echoes and future premonitions. Layers of inhibitions were peeled away and, for many, love and laughter became suddenly fresh.

McNeill drowned under controversial circumstances in 1968 at the age of 23.

 

235pp, white – beige cloth boards with Peter Max design emboss printed to front. Text block toned. Pages clean. Original non-price clipped dust jacket with toning and wear to edges including some small tears. Near fine in a very good.

 

If you liked this book, you might also enjoy this first edition copy of Love’s Master Stroke, a strange 1960s novel dedicated to the Comte De Saint Germain