Research Catalog

Title

Gentleness in the pursuit of extremity is no vice : a play in infinite acts.

Publication

[San Francisco : Communications Company, 1967]

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

Diggers (San Francisco, Calif.)

Description

[1] p.; 28 cm.

Subjects

• Counterculture > California > San Francisco
• Haight-Ashbury (San Francisco, Calif.) > Social life and customs > 20th century
• Counterculture > California > San Francisco > History > 20th century
• Spiritual life > New Age movement

Note

• Broadside mimeograph typescript printed in green and blue on white paper.
• Announcing a Haight Street gathering on April 2, [1967], at 1:00 p.m., as a theatrical production ("a play in infinite acts by the people") seeking the participation of "hippies, provos, diggers, anarchists, beatniks, spades, [...] Hell's Angels, Old Europeans, Catholics, Jews, Buddhists, atheists, on lookers, tourists, existentialists, [...] civilrights [sic] groups, musicians, clergymen, and other interested parties. [...] The streets belong to those who live in them. Those who live on Haights [sic] Street are neither loiterers, vagrants, nuisances, nor undesirables. They are the tenants of the street; angels of the corners, minor saints of the intersection [...] super-nova lovers, keristas, sexual buddhas, [...] To take possession of the street Not As An Act Of Challenge, Hostility, Showdown, War, But As An Extension Of Our Own Lives We Need It To Play On."
• The Communication Company was the publishing arm of the Diggers. Its mimeographs were produced on two Gestetner machines owned and operated by the novelist Chester Anderson beginning in January 1967, with the assistance of his proteges, Claude and Helene Hayward. They used the name "Communication Company," often abbreviated to "ComCo."
• The Diggers were an anarchist, guerrilla, street-theater group in San Francisco, 1965-1973, which inspired a sister group in London. They took their name from the mid-17th-century English Diggers (and Levellers)--revolutionary Utopians who exploited the dislocations of the Civil War to promulgate their vision of a propertyless, classless society. The most famous services provided by the San Francisco Diggers were distributing free food every day in the park and their Free Stores, in which everything (clothing, tools, books, etc.) was free. The Diggers coined various slogans that became popular in counterculture circles and soon after in society at large. The best known of these are "Do your own thing" and "Today is the first day of the rest of your life."

Access (note)

• Restricted access;

Call Number

Berg Coll+ Counterculture Diggers G46 1967

OCLC

785240946

Title

Gentleness in the pursuit of extremity is no vice : a play in infinite acts.

Imprint

[San Francisco : Communications Company, 1967]

Access

Restricted access; request permission from holding division.

Local Note

Communication Company imprint attribution by broadside dealer.

Connect to:

Request access to this item in the Berg Collection

Added Author

Diggers (San Francisco, Calif.)

Research Call Number

Berg Coll+ Counterculture Diggers G46 1967