Jack Kerouac is a perfect example of a writer going beyond the page. His work (or what I have read of it) is good, very good, but his life truly is an exceptional story that undeniably deserves to have been recorded in his guerrilla-style writing that is so iconically his own. I can not talk about On the Road without a little history lesson about the book, and the characters that surround it.
In high school, my AP U.S History final was a presentation on the Beat Generation, and I am sad to say that I know an Ivy Leauger who was unaware of Mr. Kerouac and this influential change in writing. The Beats basically consist of a group of prigs in New York in the late forties through the early sixties that experimented with drugs, sexuality and renounced nuclear family values. These poets include Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs, and Jack Kerouac. Kerouac includes all of these savants in his book under pseudonyms. However, it is Dean Moriarty, the real-life Neal Cassady, who steals the show in this autobiographical novel.
Jack wrote allegedly wrote On the Road in the span of two weeks on a 120-page scroll (no indentations or paragraphs) so he wouldn’t have to waste time changing the paper in his typewriter (obviously high on speed). It took him years to edit it, but still, it is very impressive that he pooped out such a masterpiece in such a short duration of mental vigor. I will admit, I have mimicked these writing tactics, but have yet to write something as wonderfully entertaining as On the Road.
There isn’t any plot. There is a story. I will admit, I can’t remember much, or any of it other than it was enjoyable to digest. Jack Kerouac received criticism from Truman Capote that he wasn’t writing, he was typing; that the whole book was just a stream of consciousness “vomited onto the page.” A part of me does not disagree. The other part of me doesn’t care. I am not a believer that writing, more importantly, fiction, has to be confined to only the imagined plot-line. Sometimes what is grounded in reality, “close to the bone” is still an exceptional work of art. I really did enjoy this book. It didn’t show off and was exactly what you might expect from a Columbia drop-out.
I fell in love with Neal Cassady. Possibly one of the most maddening, tragic heroes I have ever had the experience of knowing through the page. There was no hiding who these people were – lost souls. And very young. For how prophetic the Beats claim to be, I never took away any nuggets of deep wisdom. Instead, there is a lot of manic rambling from Dean. It gets old, but it is also refreshing. It is what I think this whole culture was founded on. Superficial depth. I liked it goddamnit.
85/100
Ben Bonkoske 