Allen Ginsberg’s poem “Howl” was first published in 1956.
City Lights Books issued Howl and Other Poems as Pocket Poets Number 4 in November 1956. The book made Ginsberg internationally famous and became a defining publication of the Beat Generation. Its long lines, frank subjects, and intense catalogues challenged conventional ideas about poetic form and acceptable public speech.
The poem had been performed earlier. Ginsberg first read “Howl” publicly at the Six Gallery in San Francisco on October 7, 1955. That reading is often treated as a landmark event in Beat literary history, but the publication date is 1956 rather than 1955.
Another frequent confusion concerns the obscenity trial surrounding the book. Customs officials seized copies in 1957, and a San Francisco judge later ruled that the poem had redeeming social importance. The controversy helped expand its readership rather than erase it from public circulation.