There was a period during my teen years when I toyed with the idea of becoming a "beatnik", but I don't think I was ever really serious. It's more likely that I was - like any teenager - just trying to find myself, and see if I could figure out where I was going with my life. Still, being a beatnik sounded pretty good at the time.
I would guess that most people know what a beatnik was, but I probably should explain it for those who don't. Beatnik was the semi-serious nickname given to anyone who believed in the philosophy of the "beat generation", which was started by followers of the writings of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and others. It was a movement that seemed to embrace a sort of dissatisfaction, 
yearning, and sense of displacement, along with a definite anti-materialistic attitude.
The more rebellious aspects - laid back and mellow as they were - probably suited a lot of young people at the time, and I will confess that the idea intrigued me. The media built an image of beatniks reading their own poetry in smoky coffee-shops, complete with black berets, goatees, and of course, bongo drums. It was cartoonish and - as always with the media - so over-hyped that it became a joke, culminating in silly characters like Maynard G. Krebs on the Dobie Gillis TV show. (Remember that? Bob Denver before he was shipwrecked on Gilligan's Island?)
I didn't buy into the whole thing — I got the drums (that's me in the picture - gotta love the socks) and tried to read
some of the literature, but that's about as far as I went into beatnik-hood. However, I did continue playing the bongos as much as possible, and I'd like to think I got pretty good — at least for an untalented, self-taught and delusional amateur. I know that I played them often enough to thoroughly annoy other members of the household, which is often a fringe benefit for teenagers. I eventually tired of pretending to be an aspiring beatnik, and the drums were forgotten.
Small hand-beaten drums probably go back to the dawn of civilization, but the bongo configuration is thought to have originated in Africa, later migrating with slaves to Latin America. In modern musical terms, it's probably most closely identified with Cuban music, and here's a good example. It's the Klazz Brothers (who are actually German) performing "Mondango", from their album Jazz Meets Cuba.
Hmmm... wonder what ever happened to my bongos?
Article comments
1 - Connie Phillips
As unusual, this Retro Redux was a wonderful walk down memory lane. There use to be a set of bongos at my grandmother's house, belonging to one of my many uncles, and it would be the first thing we kids would seek out when visiting, probably as you say for the "adult annoyance" factor.
That whole beatnik culture had appeal for me, but by the time I was old enough to declare a self-identity, it was the mid-80s.
2 - BIg Geez
Thanks for the comment, Connie. The whole beatnik thing is a pretty vivid memory for me, but that might be because of finding that old picture of myself, which is 45-50 years old. I really do wonder what ever happened to my bongos. Probably went for two bucks in a garage sale.
3 - Holly Hughes
The minute you said "beatnik" I thought of Maynard G. Krebs -- and then I scrolled down and there was his picture. His signature line: whenever anyone mentioned "work," he'd yelp, "WORK?!" as if he'd heard a dirty word. Maynard G., the original slacker.
Speaking of bongos, ever see the 1958 movie "Bell, Book, and Candle" (a protoype for the TV show "Bewitched")? Jack Lemmon plays the brother of the witch, played by the never-more-luscious Kim Novak; he's a warlock, but a beatnik warlock who performs in Greenwich Village clubs on the bongos. Lemmon's satanic expression as he whacks away on those bongos is a joy to behold. Equalled only by the zest with which he plucks his stand-up bass in "Some Like It Hot"...
4 - BIg Geez
Yes, I do remember the movie - although I'd forgotten about Jack Lemmon. I remember that Jimmy Stewart was 25 years older than Kim Novak, and that he made "Vertigo" with her about the same time.
Thanks for the comments.