Richard Farina
Richard George Fariña was an American writer and folksinger.
With an Irish mother and a Cuban father, Farina was born a rebel. He grew up in Brooklyn, pre-revolutionary Cuba and Ireland. At 18 he was associated with members of the IRA, and was asked to leave Ireland. At Cornell University in the late fifties Farina was suspended for his part in a student protest, but was promptly reinstated when fellow students threatened to take further action to support him.
Leaving Cornell in 1959, he lived in Paris and London, surviving by 'music, street-singing, scriptwriting, acting, a little smuggling, anything to hang on'. In 1963 he returned to America and married Mimi Baez, sister of Joan, and they became a folk duo. Their debut album was recommended by the New York Times as one of the ten best releases of 1965.
Farina was killed in a motorbike accident, just two days after his book Been Down so Long It Looks Like Up to Me had been published. The book has become a cult classic among fans of the 1960s and counterculture literature. The novel also had a huge influence on his close friend Thomas Pynchon, who later dedicated his book Gravity's Rainbow (1973) to Fariña
“god, they say, is love. and some one's got to pass the word.”
“In the room, the cats eat mad spaghettiTalking of Lawrence Ferlinghetti.--from "The Dream Song of J. Alfred Kerowack.”
“The conscience of my elusive race gives not a fig for me, baby. But I endure, if you know what I mean.”
“we mistake induction for generation.”
“be careful. you are what you eat.”
“Been down so long it looks like up to me.”