Visions of Gerard: A Novel
by Jack Kerouac
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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 475)
Read in March, 2002
Like every sixteen year old male who was tired of the suburban life and wanted to break free of it all, I became obsessed with Kerouac. A young, liberal English teacher at my very small, very conservative high school helped me explore Kerouac's other works through an expansive research project my senior year. Having aged slightly and moved past a lot of the teenage angst that every high schooler seems to go through, Kerouac seems like a bizarre relic. He moved from the icon of freedom and a l...more
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Read in January, 2008
Kerouac's paean to his elder brother Gerard - who died from a rheumatic heart at age 10 - was neither as wussy as I expected, nor was it as rambly and self-indulgent as J.D. Salinger's similar work, Seymour: An Introduction. Through a series of vignettes set in the year leading up to Gerard's passing and funeral, Kerouac does a fine job conveying the good-hearted, optimistic person his brother was, and makes a strong case for his admiration even years after the fact. The incessant "s...more
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Read in January, 2008
recommends it for:
anyone who can deal with lack of sentence structure
um, it's sorta told through the memory of the point of view of a 3-year-old watching his brother (angelic prophet as far as the younger sibling is concerned, 9-years-old) die. um, it's beautiful, and so sadly accurate, remembering how my brothers seemed to be as i was first understanding reality, objectivity, understanding the religion of my parents and the form heaven took in my childish imagination.
"well why are you crying"
"...you don't understand, you're too young to u...more
"well why are you crying"
"...you don't understand, you're too young to u...more
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For those of you who are not familiar, you could consider this Kerouac's Death Be Not Proud (in the fashion of John Gunther). Having experienced my own brother's death at a young age, I can say emotions in this work are right on. The nostalgia and glorified version you create of your lost one is exemplified in Kerouac's own rendition of his brother. I really respect this work. It is a fresh breath of Kerouac's literature, geared far from the "Beat" aesthetic.
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Jack Kerouac said this was his 'most serious sad and true book yet', and I'm sure it must have meant a lot to him, since it was based on the death of his younger brother Gerard, written from his own (or at least his alter ego Duluoz's) perspective as a child. Sadly, it was lost on me - again, maybe because I read it after I'd read far too much Kerouac by then already.
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Another one of the smaller books with a big heart. The excesses which bug some people about Kerouac aren't present here. One problem might some of the cloying sentimentality but I think the amount of energy that JK builds into his prose pushes concerns like that to the side.
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Read in February, 2002
recommends it for:
anyone
A heartbreaking retelling of the life and death of Jack Kerouac's older brother, who died when Jack was three years old. A brief and well done narrative, told through the memories of a child. I'm going to cry just writing about this book. I'm such a pansy.
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A Buddhist-Catholic prose meditation on innocence and loss. An entryway into Kerouac's big heart. Utter beauty and tenderness.
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this book is a fictional account of Jack Kerouac's childhood, focusing on the sickness and eventual death of his older brother. It's dark, and yet has some beautiful insights into the death and grieving process.
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Read in January, 2005
Uber depressing, but beautifully written. About Kerouac's older brother who died at nine years old. The slacker 's song "Close my eyes" is based on this book, if any of you are ska fans.
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I do not really recommend this unless you are a die hard Kerouac fan. It chronicles the death of his kid brother, and does not celebrate life as his other books seem to.
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hallucinations of childhood and his holy brother who saves a mouse, gets mad at the cat like christ whipping the moneychangers and an ending...
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this book is a great cup of coffee and a cigarette. i don't smoke anymore, but it gives me that nicotine twinge. a lovely little book.
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