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On the Road (Duluoz Legend)

by Jack Kerouac

3.63 · rating details · 79,446 ratings · 5,035 reviews

Jack Kerouac's classic novel of freedom and longing defined what it meant to be "Beat" and has inspired every generation since its initial publication more than forty years ago.

Introduction by Ann Charters

Paperback, 307 pages

Published January 3rd 2006 by Penguin Classics (first published 1957)

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Sep 30, 2007

Jessica rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: fourteen-year-old assholes

Shelves: bad-reads, dicklits

This is probably the worst book I have ever finished, and I'm forever indebted to the deeply personality-disordered college professor who assigned it, because if it hadn't been for that class I never would've gotten through, and I gotta tell you, this is the book I love to hate.

I deeply cherish but don't know that I fully agree with Truman Capote's assessment: that _On the Road_ "is not writing at all -- it's typing."

Lovely, Turman, but let's be clear: typing by...more

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Dec 07, 2011

Ian Graye rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: reviews

A View from the Couch

OTR has received some negative reviews lately, so I thought I would try to explain my rating.

This novel deserves to lounge around in a five star hotel rather than languish in a lone star saloon.

Disclaimer

Please forgive my review. It is early morning and I have just woken up with a sore head, an empty bed and a full bladder.

Confesssion

Let me begin with a confession that dearly wants to become an assertion...more

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Aug 13, 2007

Jahn Sood rated it

· review of another edition

I've been thinking about this book a lot lately, so I figured that I'd go back and write something about it.

When I first read this book, I loved it as a piece of art, but its effect on me was different than I expected. So many people hail Kerouac as the artist who made them quit their jobs and go to the road, become a hippie or a beat and give up the rest. When I read it though, I had been completely obsessed with hippie culture for a long time, and it caused me to steer away fro...moreI've been thinking about this book a lot lately, so I figured that I'd go back and write something about it.

When I first read this book, I loved it as a piece of art, but its effect on me was different than I expected. So many people hail Kerouac as the artist who made them quit their jobs and go to the road, become a hippie or a beat and give up the rest. When I read it though, I had been completely obsessed with hippie culture for a long time, and it caused me to steer away from it for a while. While I thought that it would be a rollicking tale of freedom and glory, I found that all of Dean's conquests were tainted by the fact that he had to take advantage of other people every step of the way. He was a hugely entertaining character, but would have been a terrible friend, lover, or even acquaintance. From the women he married to gas station attendents, right down to Sal Paradise himself, Dean drained everything that he was right out of other people, and it eventually ruined him. It left him beat...not heart beating exhilarated, but beat up, dead beat and alone. Once I stepped back a little from the awe at Dean's greatness, this book was really sad, and it caused me to put away that romanticism for a while.

Now, 2 years later, though, On the Road is coming back to me full on. I didn't escape the total wonder at the Beats and the road. I have been on the road myself for the last 2 months and have a long way to go before I get back home, and I am constantly aware that the the way was paved by Kerouac and the rest of the crazy geniuses of his generation. The road is every bit as romantic as Sal Paradise made it out to be, and its glory far out weighs the short comings of Dean as a friend. I mean, the road is a lot like Dean, it takes a lot out of you, but you get addicted to it and obsessed with it and can't let it go, and I don't think there's any other way about it. I am in love with America for the first time. Now that I've seen it, driven across and up and down, around and over America, I find it sublime and incredible. I think that Kerouac and his friends might've been the first to see that. Maybe not. Maybe they are just part of all of American history...they translated the world of Western expansion and canvas covered wagons into the way of the modern world. America is something to dream about. It is worthy every exuberant and formerly offensive "I'm proud" sticker that's plastered on the back of a pick up truck. And Kerouac saw that first hand. So, it seems, that there is a certain tragedy in this book, but that it is less important than the unavoidable glory that you come to associate with the road and freedom after following these guys on their crazy adventure. I think this book should be read by everyone who wants to know about America.(less)

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Apr 25, 2007

Adam rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

I'm supposed to like On the Road, right? Well, I don't. I hate it and I always have. There are a lot of reasons why I hate it. I find Kerouac's attitude toward the world pathetically limited and paternalistic. In On the Road he actually muses about how much he wishes that he could have been born "a Negro in the antebellum South," living a simple life free from worry, and does so seemingly without any sense of irony. On every page, the book is about how Kerouac (a young, white, middle-c...more

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Aug 03, 2008

Katherine rated it

· review of another edition

Things I liked about On the Road.
-It's a hymn to wild rides, all-night conversations with strangers, lunacy, letting life happen, and getting out of your life and experiencing the world.

-The energetic, random, bursting-with-possibility, jazz-inspired prose. I listened to the audiobook version, and the narrator affected an "oh wowwww maaaan" hippie accent that really added to it as well.

-The way it seems to invite you in, calling to your sense of adventure ...more

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Jun 16, 2008

Kevin Quinley rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: avoid-like-aids

A few months back I read Stephen Ambrose's "Undaunted Courage", a harrowing account of cross-country exploration made poignant by the character studies of adventurers Lewis & Clark. Undeterred in their mission to map the uncharted territories, the account of their expedition reminds readers of the vast wonders encompassed within America's borders. Equally awe-inspiring from the scope of their accomplishment and the natural beauty encountered, I felt compelled to perhaps make my own pil...moreA few months back I read Stephen Ambrose's "Undaunted Courage", a harrowing account of cross-country exploration made poignant by the character studies of adventurers Lewis & Clark. Undeterred in their mission to map the uncharted territories, the account of their expedition reminds readers of the vast wonders encompassed within America's borders. Equally awe-inspiring from the scope of their accomplishment and the natural beauty encountered, I felt compelled to perhaps make my own pilgrimage west, alas any eventual voyage will lack the thrilling sense of discovery (of course also safe from the considerable threats) evoked in the Ambrose text. Unfortunately, after reading Kerouac's book, depicting a relatively worthless industrial landscape, I am reminded of the very real human egotism driving behavior and far less enthusiastic for far-flung ventures.

The book's common thread seems to be characters who will travel thousands of miles in search of a hamburger. Traveling to major urban cities leaves these restless souls unsatisfied until the climatic trip to Mexico, treated reverentially in a sharp contrast from the detachment associated with America. F'n Mexico?! An orgiastic trip to a Mexican brothel where the narrator leers at a teenager is the novel's spiritual apex, a stirring reminder of the potential for human depravity but a complete disappointment for readers attempting to understand Kerouac's considerable legacy. The narrator bizarrely swoons over companion Dean Mortiary epitomize unbridled living but whose M.O. depends on leeching from others and fathering children out of wedlock. References to Dean's own loser father permit sympathy for the man, but as an iconic figure he was shockingly repellent, just one in the litany of uninteresting characters peppering the novel.

Readers desiring a truly fresh perspective should just buy some psyclobin mushrooms and avoid the time you would otherwise waste reading this book. Far from understanding the genesis of the beat generation, I read Kerouac craft a self-indulgent justification for aimless wandering and its pitiable virtues. (less)

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May 06, 2008

Lostinanovel rated it

· review of another edition

I personally can't stand the characters. They cover up irresponsibility and real hurt to people in the guise of being artists. However, I do think there is more to this story.

Sure, they are jerks and they are bums and they are full of a lot of BS but as the book progresses, it becomes clear that they know it. These guys are also WW2 vets, and very dissimilar to the hippies who follow them, they do not have any anti-American or anti-establishment feelings. Also, they show a deep r...more

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Sep 20, 2007

Derek rated it

· review of another edition

The author William Kirn, in a piece for Slate magazine debating the merits of On The Road, wrote, "It's hard for me to summon any more 'critical distance' toward On the Road than I can toward the shape of my own face or the smell of my own sweat." I feel much the same way. For me, On the Road is inextricable from the time and place that I read it. I was, literally, on the road, looking at colleges in New England during my junior year of high school. I'd borrowed the book from my brand-...moreThe author William Kirn, in a piece for Slate magazine debating the merits of On The Road, wrote, "It's hard for me to summon any more 'critical distance' toward On the Road than I can toward the shape of my own face or the smell of my own sweat." I feel much the same way. For me, On the Road is inextricable from the time and place that I read it. I was, literally, on the road, looking at colleges in New England during my junior year of high school. I'd borrowed the book from my brand-new-girlfriend Dina upon her insistence that it was nothing short of amazing. This was also the first time I'd heard Neil Young's Harvest in its entirety. I'd prefer not to downplay any of this in terms of shaping who I became over the next few years, and for that matter, who I am now.

All of this ancillary detail and admitted nostalgia probably shouldn't have anything to do with my assessment of the book. I did, after all, read it at the absolute "perfect" time: away from home, "discovering myself," blah blah blah. But you know what? I don't care how trite it was, and maybe still is. This book knocked it out of the fucking park for me. And so what if millions of kids the same age with the same sort of background enjoyed the same sort of "spiritual" experience with the book? I didn't know that at the time. All I knew of Jack Kerouac was his picture on the cover of the book.

How much did On the Road have to do with deciding not to go to school in New England but rather staying in Pittsburgh and going to a "city school"? How much did it have to do with writing becoming my immediate, absolute focus? How much did it have to do with that girl who lent it to me, who I am still in love with today? I don't know. What I do know is that it's all part of that same package, and I couldn't remove it if I tried. And why would I want to? To portray some ill-advised disaffected post-college stance that the book just ain't that good? I don't have time for that.

If this seems defensive, or even off topic, it's because I've had to defend this book so many times. What's the point in discussing narrative structure or character development when my reaction to this book was so much more than a mere academic appreciation, when it was downright visceral? To wit, Kerouac was the wild west gunslinger staring down a group of bad guys, his finger lightly tapping his pistol; I was the little boy at home, watching him on TV with a plastic cowboy hat on my head. Do you think I'm going to waste time talking about the cinematography?

That's not to say I think the book is without substance or can't be appreciated academically. In fact, it would make for an even longer review trying to describe these. My point is that they seem too after-the-fact. It's a wonderful novel, brimming with brilliance, and deserving of the hype.
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Jan 17, 2011

Paul rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: novels

You couldn't pay me enough to re-read this baby now. Well, okay, I'd probably do it for £200. Alright, £100. Cash.

Kerouac took over from Steinbeck as the guy I had to read everything by when I was a young person. Steinbeck himself took over from Ray Bradbury. All three American males with a sentimental streak as wide as the Rio Grande.

Whole thing nearly turned me into a weepy hitchhiker who plays saxophone while he waits for a ride, then gets abducted by aliens who are...more

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Dec 21, 2007

Jacob rated it

· review of another edition

I read On The Road when I was 16. When I was 16, I was so depressed. I went to a high school that had a moat around it and a seige mentality. On The Road made me not depressed. In fact ... it made me want to hitchhike, hop freight trains, and more importantly to write. If I were still 16 I would give On The Road 5 stars. I would say, go! Go! Read this book and be mad for life, delirious, exploding outward into the big uncovered road! Consume vanilla ice cream and apple pie. Drink black coffee. F...more

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Feb 01, 2008

Maclain Rigdon rated it

· review of another edition

I was in school at the Merchant Marine Academy. I was nineteen years old; a Georgia boy. I had no business being there. The deal at the academy is that you do six months of your Sophomore year and six months of your Junior years at sea. At least that’s how it used to be. I hear they are on trimesters now. Who knows? Anyway, it was this sea year that attracted me to the school in the first place.

So I’m nineteen, heavy boozer, balls to the walls so to speak. I was coming unhing...more

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Apr 25, 2011

Schmacko rated it

· review of another edition

They're like conquerors without a wilderness to claim, cowboys with no cattle to brand.

So much has been written about Jack Kerouac's On the Road, that I am not really going to write a review. I will pose my thoughts.

I think that for that half-dozen of people who know nothing about On the Road, I will say this. It's Jack Kerouac's most famous novel – Kerouac being the "King of the Beats" and the author who gave impetus to the Beat Generation along with the career...moreThey're like conquerors without a wilderness to claim, cowboys with no cattle to brand.

So much has been written about Jack Kerouac's On the Road, that I am not really going to write a review. I will pose my thoughts.

I think that for that half-dozen of people who know nothing about On the Road, I will say this. It's Jack Kerouac's most famous novel – Kerouac being the "King of the Beats" and the author who gave impetus to the Beat Generation along with the careers of Allan Ginsburg and William Burroughs. Kerouac's own muse was a sexy, reputedly well-hung man named Neal Cassady. (Kerouac was no slouch either – they made a handsome duo.) Kerouac and Ginsburg met Cassady while they attended Columbia University – Cassady didn't attend - in the late 1940s.

On the Road is a stream-of-conscious accounting of Kerouac's several aimless wanderings with Cassady. It's listed as fiction, but most people agree it's thinly veiled fact. Jack Kerouac wrote on a single long scroll of paper a rambling account of their infidelities, meanderings, drug use, bigamy, drinking, and general lawlessness. It is am interesting novel about post-WWII men lacking a frontier to conquer. It is about ennui, aimlessness, and the destructive ends that seeking adventure and answers can lead you to. It is also about men making their own odyssey, and it has inspired generations of people to take to travel, to trust the kindness of the road without any destination in mind.

In short, it's a self-destructive tome that many people love for its freewheeling spirit, ignoring its self-destructiveness. I am not dismissing the fun Kerouac and Cassady, but I am making sure I also acknowledge their consequences, both of them dying before they reached the age of fifty. Cassady died at 42 from an apparent overdose of Seconal, and Kerouac died at 47 of cirrosis from heavy drinking.

I think the fascination for me is how people let themselves come to such ends. Some might say it is the sexy, dangerous devil in Cassady that somehow tempts others like Kerouac into ablative behavior. I think that the seeds of self-obliteration lie dormant in the person waiting for a Cassady or a bottle or a drug to come along and start the process. It's going to happen; the cause is unimportant. It happened with Verlaine and Rimbaud, it happened with Shelley and Byron. But it's also happened with Garland and studio-supplied drugs, Belushi and cocaine, INXS frontman Michael Hutchence and a belt around the neck...

But this reductive, highwire lifestyle also encouraged Kerouac to invent a new way of writing, a voice that captured a new way of looking at the world and redefined a generation. His monologue of adventure across America several times and down into Mexico is hypnotic in its power to bring you along for the ride. It inspired so many others, not the least of which were Hunter S. Thompson and Jim Morrison – self-destructive people in their own right , but also, people who have created some incredible art.

And it all starts with a sexy devil who steals a car and says, "Hey, let's go to San Francisco."
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Aug 28, 2007

Jeff rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: people with long hair.

"Oh, yeah man, On the Road. Dude, that's a good story man. So good. Yeah man... so... dude, yeah, man... dude, bro..." I had been stuck with concessions, AGAIN! My friend was producing a play, and me not being an actor, or a director, or a sound or lighting technician, but wanting to help out, got stuck with selling tickets and concessions. So I brought my book to read, and the book was ON THE ROAD. I was halfway through the book. And I sort of liked it.
I was kind of getti...more"Oh, yeah man, On the Road. Dude, that's a good story man. So good. Yeah man... so... dude, yeah, man... dude, bro..." I had been stuck with concessions, AGAIN! My friend was producing a play, and me not being an actor, or a director, or a sound or lighting technician, but wanting to help out, got stuck with selling tickets and concessions. So I brought my book to read, and the book was ON THE ROAD. I was halfway through the book. And I sort of liked it.
I was kind of getting into it. I could see it happening. I wanted to see myself driving back and forth across the country in the late 40s, early 50s (Is that when it took place? It's been awhile since I read it... and I can't say it all stuck with me). Then this happened.
There I was, minding my own business, reading my book, selling Sprites to anyone that wanted one, and this tiny, scrawny, long-haired, belt studded, black wearing hippie/cool/emo/rocker dude walks up to me and starts to talk to me about how he LOVED ON THE ROAD.
Really? Is this the target audience? Is it that cool to read Kerouac? Snap, snap daddio.
I guess so. I did like it while reading it. But since then, time has passed for me. And honestly, as more stuff goes into the brain, more and more of On The Road has been forgotten. Thus I guess it doesn't stand the test of time. Then again... I've never driven across the country, so maybe one needs that experience in order to... no wait, wait, I have driven across the country. Hmm... I've never listened to jazz in San Francisco? Listen: let me put it like this, reading On The Road is sort of like being a year into college, and you're having fun, and you're meeting new people, but you miss your old friends, and you miss the easy school assignments, and how little responsibility you had to deal with. You had this faux sense of happy nostolgia. Then you get a few years older, and then you're thinking, "No way in hell would I ever go back to high school, I don't care how hot Sunny Crane was, she's definately not worth going back for, especially if I have to sit through another damn calculus class."
On The Road: Sure Sunny Crane was hot in high school, but is she hot now? Don't know, don't really care to find out, cause there are other things on my mind.(less)

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Gar Ver Reading this book is no where near as cool as talking about it. I'd be weary of anyone who thinks its a literary bible but I'd also be weary of anyone...moreReading this book is no where near as cool as talking about it. I'd be weary of anyone who thinks its a literary bible but I'd also be weary of anyone who thinks its "not writing but typing" (Norman Mailer I'm looking in your direction)

Nothing happens in this book. There are no ancient life-secrets being unearthed by the Benzedrine pulsing through Kerouac's brain. It's a wide portrait of a short period in one man's life.

It's a classic case of "its not what you do but how you do it." Kerouac's writing style and ear for the music in everyday speech is what makes this book what it is.

I would recommend this book be read before the age of 20. All the angst and wonder and optimism and ignorance of youth may be required to make these pages burn. It should also be read out-loud.

Note of interest : the love story element in the movie "Bottle Rocket" was completely lifted/inspired by a section of "On the Road"

Jack's (Sal's) love affair with Terry also happens to be one of the most emotionally mature as well as emotionally gut wrenching digressions of the book. Although there is no real beginning, middle, or end, I believe the climax of OTR is when he has to leave Terry behind, after overcoming every imaginable hardship together just to survive.

That being said, when Jack is around Dean Mortiary, the smooth talking, fast acting, ladies man, the book takes on a very masculine air. Jack idolizes Dean as being everything he is not and as a result his thoughts and actions consistently contradict each other.

He never really connects with Dean again after leaving Terry and his travels completely corrode until the end of the book. It's almost as if she tamed the lion and brought him down to earth for good.

For what its worth, even though it's his pop culture trophy, On the Road is probably the least representative of Kerouac's overwhelming sensitivity. "The Dharma Bums" and "Visions of Gerrard" (about the short life and slow death of his brother) are much better candidates.(less)
Aug 28, 2007 04:48pm

Aug 29, 2007

Julie rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: Richard Silberman, Sean Chiki, Courtney Miller

I don't wish to be hyperbolic, but Jack Kerouac may be (unwittingly) responsible for the national standard "The Ugly American." Believe me, I SO want to drink in the carpe diem, exploratory life-lust, but his rampant, self-indulgent Id-fest left many women, friends, and strangers in its wounded wake. His women are two-dimensional, holy-whore fan-bots; his friends are so much hog twaddle compared to his idol Dean; and his pursuit of adventure required much theft to fund it (even though...more

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Aug 20, 2007

Cody rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: the-beats, americana, colorado

Matt Weiland, in the NYTimes Sunday Book Review (19 August 2007), sums up my sentiments toward *OtR* precisely:

"Twenty years ago, like so many slack 17-year-olds before and since, I devoured “On the Road” and it devoured me. The pages of my copy were dog-eared, -nosed and -throated, and I was beholden to the book in ways I can’t quite believe now. Did I really go for midnight drives down by the ruined flour mills with the tape deck blaring Dexter Gordon? Did I really attend a hi...more

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Mar 08, 2008

sarafem rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: royally-sucked, novels

I could try to review this better than Jessica, but I don't think I could rant so poetically. Let me sum it up in my own abrupt way: This book is a travesty. This book wasted approximately four hours of my life. The entire Beat movement is awful, and I tried really hard to like it, back when I smoked pot and clove cigarettes and thought Jerry Garcia and Jim Morrison were God and wore hemp necklaces and patchouli. I gave this book a more-than-fair shot, and it shot me back, right in the ass. A co...more

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Mar 16, 2010

Tim rated it

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Shelves: favorite

There are some books that are just made to be read aloud, and this is surely one of them. Will Patton does a magical job of capturing the energy, the aimlessness, the yearning, the people of Kerouac's masterpiece.

I'd somehow always managed to avoid reading this book, associating it (wrongly) with the beat poets, whom I've never been that fond of.

It's a completely different animal.

Hearing it read aloud, I can understand how it arrived like a thunderclap in t...moreThere are some books that are just made to be read aloud, and this is surely one of them. Will Patton does a magical job of capturing the energy, the aimlessness, the yearning, the people of Kerouac's masterpiece.

I'd somehow always managed to avoid reading this book, associating it (wrongly) with the beat poets, whom I've never been that fond of.

It's a completely different animal.

Hearing it read aloud, I can understand how it arrived like a thunderclap in the literary world of the late 50s, with a raw energy unlike anything that had come before. I wasn't prepared for the Walt Whitman-like love of people and places that suffuses the book, the acceptance and wonder.

It's also an amazing porthole into the past, giving us a view of a very different America, an America where "Mill City" (Mill Valley, I assume) houses immigrant shacks rather than yuppies, where Denver is a frontier town, where you can drive a thousand miles on a few dollars of gas, where people think nothing of hopping in a car to drive for days on end, sleeping in the big back seat.

And the characters are so rich and full. Dean Moriarty - a mad genius, a broken man, both in one. (Fascinating the role that Neal Cassady, his model, went on to play with Ken Kesey and others in that mad era.) I don't know if he was at all like the personality given him by Will Patton's voice, but who cares? The reading created a memorable sense of a memorable man in a memorable, transformative era.

"Do you diiiggg it?" Yes, I did.

One of my favorite scenes is the one in which Dean is explaining how a jazz performance had "It" and trying to put into words what "It" is.

I could listen to this again already - but I won't, because I've already passed it on to a friend.

P.S. The audio version is also great for hearing the repetitiveness of much of Kerouac's imagery - "the sad night" and so on. You imagine an editor wanting to fix that, but that sense of "rough draft" is a key part of Kerouac's style. It may actually have been calculated, but it gives a fabulous impression of spilling from the typewriter in a mad, undisciplined rush. (The story of it having been written in three weeks is overstated, apparently. Yes, there is the scroll. But that came after years of notebooks and lots of rewriting.) Hearing it aloud gives it a kind of Homeric quality, where repetition is a virtue rather than a flaw.
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Sep 25, 2011

Marco Tamborrino rated it

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E non smisi nemmeno per un attimo di pensare a Dean e a come fosse salito sul treno e si fosse fatto più di cinquemila chilometri sopra quell'orrida terra senza nemmeno sapere il perché, se non per vedere me.

"Sulla strada" è un romanzo che andrebbe letto tutto d'un fiato, tutto in una volta. È un romanzo che non lascia il tempo di respirare, il tempo di fermarsi e mettersi a pensare che razza di vista si sta facendo. Anche i momenti di apparente calma sono falsi, illusioni....moreE non smisi nemmeno per un attimo di pensare a Dean e a come fosse salito sul treno e si fosse fatto più di cinquemila chilometri sopra quell'orrida terra senza nemmeno sapere il perché, se non per vedere me.

"Sulla strada" è un romanzo che andrebbe letto tutto d'un fiato, tutto in una volta. È un romanzo che non lascia il tempo di respirare, il tempo di fermarsi e mettersi a pensare che razza di vista si sta facendo. Anche i momenti di apparente calma sono falsi, illusioni. Sembra che si sia trovato il proprio posto nel mondo e invece niente, era solo una sensazione passeggera. Perché dare un nome a questa generazione, perché chiamara "Beat Generation"? Quelli che l'hanno vissuta non potevano stare fermi, muoversi era più forte di loro, la strada stessa diventa un personaggio del libro, mentre per loro è un amico cui ritornare dopo pochi giorni di relativa quiete. La strada li porta dalla costa orientale a quella occidentale degli Stati Uniti e viceversa, e ogni volta sembra essere una novità, anche se poi, quando si fa ritorno, ci si sente solo tristi.

Potremmo inquadrare il romanzo di Kerouac come un racconto sul fantastico personaggio di Dean Moriarty (Neal Cassady), colui sul quale puntano i riflettori dello scrittore per tutte le quasi quattrocento pagine. C'è un punto in cui Dean viene abbandonato da tutti. Nessuno più sopporta quel suo fare approfittatore, quel suo sfruttare un amico e poi piantarlo in asso quando gli fa più comodo e ha finito di sfruttarlo. A quel punto Sal Paradise (Jack Kerouac) gli si fa ancora più vicino, e qui rimando al titolo della recensione. La fine del romanzo mi ha lasciato un certo disagio, una certa malinconia, come se Dean si fosse alla fine reso conto di quanto vuota fosse la sua vita, di quanto provasse a riempirla viaggiango e viaggiando, beandosi del mondo e godendoselo fino in fondo. Aveva forse capito che quel suo amico l'aveva salvato, gli aveva mostrato come ci si doveva accontentare di una famiglia dopo infiniti viaggi in giro per l'America e il Messico.

Francamente non riesco a comprendere i tanti commenti negativi che ho letto un po' dappertutto. È il semplice manifesto di un'America che sta cambiando. Che dalla depressione degli anni '30 e dalla Seconda Guerra Mondiale attraversa un breve periodo prima di diventare l'America che è oggi. E in questo cambiamento abbiamo avuto la Beat Generation. Abbiamo avuto questi giovani che non sapevano se il mondo era un luogo che ogni tanto stesse fermo, oltre a muoversi. E per non venir sorpassati, si muovevano anche loro.

E così in America quando il sole tramonta e me ne sto seduto sul vecchio molo diroccato del fiume a guardare i lunghi cieli lungo il New Jersey e sento tutta quella terra nuda che si srotola in un'unica incredibile enorme massa fino alla costa occidentale, e a tutta quella strada che corre, e a tutta quella gente che sogna nella sua immensità e so che a quell'ora nello Iowa i bambini stanno piangendo nella terra in cui si lasciano piangere i bambini, e che stanotte spunteranno le stelle, e non sapete che Dio è Winnie Pooh?, e che la stella della sera sta tramontando e spargendo le sue fioche scintille sulla prateria proprio prima dell'arrivo della notte fonda che benedisce la terra, oscura tutti i fiumi, avvolge le vette e abbraccia le ultime spiagge, e che nessuno, nessuno sa cosa toccherà a nessun altro, allora penso a Dean Moriarty, persino al vecchio Dean Moriarty padre che non abbiamo mai trovato, penso a Dean Moriarty.(less)

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Feb 23, 2008

Jessica rated it

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Shelves: favorites

I read this book at the perfect time in my life, as though it had been written for me to read at that exact moment. It changed my ideas about traveling and really living life. It made me rethink my concept of what it means to be free. But most of all, it made me excited for all the adventures I had yet to experience.

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Apr 15, 2011

Meagan rated it

When I was 16,I read this book called 'Neo-Bohemia'and the author made so many references to 'On The Road'by Jack Kerouac and prior to this book I had never even heard of Kerouac or any of the 'Beats'.I had no idea what 'beat' was,so I never understand that scene on that episode of 'The Simpsons' where the character Ned Flanders is thinking about his childhood and we see his parents talking to the pyschiatrist and they're Beats until after I began to read Kerouac and Ginsberg and all of the othe...more

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Apr 02, 2010

Trice rated it

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Shelves: literature, travel-place, bookaddicts2010challenge, 2010

***1/2 Such a weird, strange experience of a read, but in the end I came to see the journey a bit more clearly. I'm still convinced of the absolute selfishness of the group, Dean at the lead, and a general sense of Sal as a weak actor - he always seemed to need Dean to spur him along, whether it was Dean's idea or his own, and if Dean wasn't around he was driven by circumstances.

But the strong current through the book is one of restlessness and needing to move on, something I under...more***1/2 Such a weird, strange experience of a read, but in the end I came to see the journey a bit more clearly. I'm still convinced of the absolute selfishness of the group, Dean at the lead, and a general sense of Sal as a weak actor - he always seemed to need Dean to spur him along, whether it was Dean's idea or his own, and if Dean wasn't around he was driven by circumstances.

But the strong current through the book is one of restlessness and needing to move on, something I understand to its core. It seems they were looking for an experience beyond what they had known, which was part of why they kept going back and forth across the country. I'm not sure if it was my own experience affecting my reading there, but it certainly seemed that as soon as they went south as opposed to west or east, and crossed the border into Mexico, they found something of a peace for their restless souls - here was wonder and discovery, and a truly new land. The new becomes something of a promised land in itself. They've spent the previous journeys 'digging' anything unusual or just the way people do things, but now, they're so 'into' what they're seeing and experiencing, including the jungle on an almost unbearably hot night, that they're beyond 'digging' it.

I think I dug this book, although it took me a long while to get into it. Hearing Kerouac reading some bits definitely altered the way I was reading it, understanding better the way he was trying to communicate with his readers, and helped me get more into it. I've never really been into what aficionados would call real jazz music - I like blues and some of the stuff actually labeled 'jazz,' but I do not enjoy the stuff that wanders all over the place without a central melody winding in its midst. Perhaps I haven't yet listened long enough to hear that central melody? Anyway, in spite of my lack of enthusiasm for this type of music, reading that this was written as something of a textual jazz improv helped me to read it differently and have a deeper sympathy for the journey. It was even another of those books I wanted to turn right back to the beginning when I finished and begin again, especially with how he leaves things with Dean, to see if I understand or hear more in the beginning, enlightened by the ending.

I should say that in the midst of the wandering, semi-random, and the statement of straight action, Kerouac has some beautiful passages describing what Sal sees. Nestled into aimless action are gems of revelation. And if that doesn't truly describe the experience of life, I don't know what does.

********

Still reading - my opinion is going from one extreme to another. Finally ran to the internet to try to find some educated discussion thereof thinking that I must be missing a lot in the way I'm reading this. As always, NPR comes through:
http://www.npr.org/programs/morning/features/patc/ontheroad/
A really nice, really thorough radio report with some excellent links and additional recordings. Leave it to Kerouac to write (or type at least) on a scroll of paper. I love the comparison to jazz improvisation and that idea of On the Road as a valentine to America, the country Jack Kerouac loved. One commenter notes he was always saying, "Anybody can make Paris holy, but I can make Topeka holy." From the bits they feature of Kerouac reading the book, I think this one works better as a told tale, than as one read.
********
The experience: love the fact that I bought this book at Wei's, a foreign-run cafe here in southwestern China, shortly after a fascinating conversation with a middle-aged Dutch man who went to America around the age of 20, bought a rundown car and drove around the country exploring. Along the way he met an older Sioux man who taught him where he could get short-term jobs and free food, but then left one day a month or so later, stepping out of the car when the young traveler was stopped at a traffic light. Not a word of farewell. It goes so well with reading this book. I asked him if he was ever going to write an account of his own travels - I look forward to reading it someday.(less)

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Aug 19, 2009

Elle rated it

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This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. The danger of dreams and ideals become clear in this book. What I mean is, if you believe you know what something is, if you believe the myth of it, whether it's a country, romance, another person, who you're supposed to be or even a book, you may spend all your time looking for reinforcement of your ideas and none actually seeing what is.

This book does that, hopefully more than I do it to the book. The vision given in these pages reinforces and sees U.S. culture and ideals in a str...moreThe danger of dreams and ideals become clear in this book. What I mean is, if you believe you know what something is, if you believe the myth of it, whether it's a country, romance, another person, who you're supposed to be or even a book, you may spend all your time looking for reinforcement of your ideas and none actually seeing what is.

This book does that, hopefully more than I do it to the book. The vision given in these pages reinforces and sees U.S. culture and ideals in a strange lopsided mix. The main character Salvatore/ Paradise [Save Paradise?:] begins a quest in the great "American" tradition--by road trip, trips actually. There's a longing in him for some deeper meaning or connection or understanding of life, American life, the country, a father, a home, the people sharing the same place and time, for love, to really experience life, to find himself. He often goes with or to be with his friend Dean Moriarty [Sherlock Holmes' nemesis/alterego?:]. He seems to seek a geographical solution to a metaphysical emptiness. He finds that the myth is hollow. When the white-haired prophet he has long awaited arrives, walking to him in the dark, the prophet says only, "Go moan for man." This book is the Ecclesiastes of a generation.

There is so much abandonment in this book. Neither of the main characters, Sal or Dean, have parents. None of the women Dean marries and has children with he manages to stay with, for long. They know lots of people but none of them well. They are constantly alienating people. using or being used by them, using everything up, including their lives. Everything breaks down--cars, relationships, bodies. They travel through so many places, drinking, listening to jazz, talking, talking, yet see so little of them. They pay attention to how they feel about each person, each moment, and that constantly changes and is lost.

"I realized these were the snapshots which our children would look at someday with wonder, thinking their parents had lived smooth, well-ordered, stabilized-within-the-photo lives and got up in the morning to walk proudly on the sidewalks of life never dreaming the raggedy madness and riot of our actual lives, our actual night, the hell of it, the senseless nightmare road. All of it inside endless and beginningless emptiness. Pitiful forms of ignorance.... I gaped into the bleakness of my own days. I had an awful long way to go too."

Snapshots:

Sal talks to a girl on a bus, and asks her, "'What do you want out of life?' I wanted to take it and wring it out of her. She didn't have the slightest idea what she wanted.... 'What are we all aching to do? What do we want?' She didn't know. She yawned. She was sleepy. It was too much. Nobody could tell. Nobody would ever tell. It was all over. She was eighteen and most lovely, and lost."

"'It's not my fault! It's not my fault!' I told him, 'Nothing in this lousy world is my fault, don't you see that? I don't want it to be and it can't be and it won't be."

Before I read it, I thought this book was about the 60s, but the narrative finishes before then. I hope I saw this book for what it was. It seems the hunger for meaningful lives runs deep through the literature we call classics, a human hunger embodied culturally. It's good to know how others have perceived and expressed the trap of cultural expectations. I think I understand a little why it spoke to so many people, and still does.

(less)

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Jul 16, 2011

Sparrow rated it

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Recommended to Sparrow by: Erica

Shelves: memoir-biography

The other day I was talking to someone and he said, “Well, I’m no pie expert . . . Wait! No! I am a pie expert. I am an expert at pie!”

Another person asked, “How did you become a pie expert?”

“One time I ate only pie for an entire week. I was driving across the country with my buddies, and we decided to eat only pie.”

“Like Jack Kerouac in On the Road!” I said.

“Yes! Exactly! That’s exactly what we were doing. We were reading On the Road, and ...more

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Jan 01, 2009

Junio rated it

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I've been doing a lot of commuting and have taken to listening to books on tape. On The Road is read by Matt Dillon, and he does a great job. Turns out he should have been a beat poet.

The text is a pretty good one, it follows a natural story arc, while seeming to be completely happenstance. It follows the relationship between Sal Paradise (Kerouac) and Dean Moriarty, an outcast among the intellectuals whom Sal associates. Dean's early circumstances suggest the terrible mistakes that ...more

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Sep 22, 2007

Bret rated it

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Recommends it for: high school + college grads

Crammed into the seat of a college lecture hall, I daydreamed about 'Semester at Sea', a floating college campus that carries students from different schools to places like Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Africa etc. etc. I begged and pleaded for enrollment but my penny-pinching father forbid me and refused to fund the trip. I swore that I would break loose the very instant I bubbled in the letter 'C' on my last final exam at Penn State.

At the end of the summer of '97, I roadtr...moreCrammed into the seat of a college lecture hall, I daydreamed about 'Semester at Sea', a floating college campus that carries students from different schools to places like Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Africa etc. etc. I begged and pleaded for enrollment but my penny-pinching father forbid me and refused to fund the trip. I swore that I would break loose the very instant I bubbled in the letter 'C' on my last final exam at Penn State.

At the end of the summer of '97, I roadtripped from Connecticut to the West Coast in an '89 Ford Escort Wagon. My travelling partner was 'Styles'(I honestly can't remember his real name), a breakdancer from the British Channel islands who worked with me as a summer camp counselor after my college graduation in May. He wanted to see the country after being cooped up in a swampy, mosquito infested summer camp in the middle of the woods in Connecticut--basically a dump for neglected rich kids on ritalin. We had just been fired from the camp for drinking booze on our overnight (the first and only time we drank on the premises), with our campers deep-sleeping in a cabin nearby our celebratory, raging bonfire. Some ultra-conservative counselor snitched on us after I stumbled into the girls quarters to invite them to our little party. With my fraternity bonds still intact apparantly, my pecker did all the talking.

Anyway, we woke up the next morning without jobs and fled the director's meeting room for the Wild West. Styles brought a videorecorder so he could showcase his American adventure to friends and family back home, to all the 'blokes' and 'birds'. Our first stop was the Grand Canyon. Hours away from our destination, dark skies crept in so we slept for a couple hours in the car, too broke to afford a hotel room. We woke up to the Arizona sunrise, glowing beet red against a foreground marked by shadows of scattered boulders. I never felt so awake on two hours sleep. We drove onward toward the Canyon.

When I first gazed over the Grand Canyon, I felt strangly aware, for the first time in my life, of the presence of the native tribes who still live among us and consider the earth more of a home than we ever will: pure, raw, undisturbed and wild, yet accomodating. That night, we pitched tent in the Grand Canyon's state park campground and survived an extremely windy ice storm that nearly tore the stakes of my Coleman 3-man tent clear out of the sandy floor. The gusts roared through the vinyl fabric and burrowed into our ears, but we snored like babies, exhausted from seemingly endless hours of driving without sleep.

On to the beaches of Los Angeles, starting with Venice and then Malibu and Laguna. 'Styles' was sure to take plenty of footage of all the American 'birds' on the beach. Every few seconds he'd turn to me with his jaw dropped, as if he suspected that I knew of this paradise all along but preferred to stay trapped in a musty cabin, nagging 8 year olds to brush their teeth before 'lights out'.

"On The Road" brings me back to a time when I wanted to do everything before I was sure what I really want to do. I just took off and stopped when I couldn't go any longer but continued as soon as I could not bear to sit still another moment. Jack Kerouac captures the spirit of youth in "On The Road" and reminds me how incredible life can feel when I'm not busy making plans.

(less)

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Jul 09, 2007

Jason Pettus rated it

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I'm almost 40 and I still love Jack Kerouac's Beat Generation classic On the Road, and screw you if you think otherwise! Oops, whew, sorry about that! It's just that I've had to be a defender of that opinion for so long now, for all the usual reasons: because Kerouac's natural writing style, for example, is one step away from natural parody to begin with, because the Beats were one of the first underground groups to get co-opted by the mainstream media, so there were a lot of parodies that came ...more

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Jul 05, 2007

Ryan rated it

This novel was quite a change of pace from the last few books I’ve read. For one thing, it has no discernable plot. Sal Paradise, the main character, basically just romps around America with his buddy Dean Moriarty searching for fun and adventure. This book is great for three reasons. Firstly, Dean is one of the most interesting characters in literature, always seemingly high on something or another, digging everything and conning everyone. Second, it may be the only book I’ve ever read tha...more

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Nov 18, 2007

Lilly G rated it

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Recommends it for: teenagers

The first 50 pages I was really into the jazzy prose of ON THE ROAD. I never knew it would be so stream-of-conscious-be-boppy.

But then, once I had settled into his unique style, I started reading for the story. Problems arose: I just didn't care anymore. Maybe it's the maturing woman in me, but I found the adventures of this bumbling group of guys slightly annoying. I think when I was 15 or 16 I would have devoured their reckless abandon and their willingness to just go where the ...more

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Nov 11, 2009

Trevor rated it

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Shelves: literature

There are people, I’m quite prepared to admit, that I am more than happy to spend time with – even an entire week if needs be - as long, that is, as they agree to remain within proper and predictable boundaries. And often those boundaries are pretty well fixed by the covers of the book that I find them in. Look, I don’t mind if you don’t wash or you get so drunk or stoned or both that you find yourself fast asleep hanging onto a toilet to make sure you don’t fall off the world. I don’t care if ...more

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Trevor Truth be told, I think I prefer the knock offs too.
Nov 13, 2009 12:34pm

notgettingenough Kristen wrote: "For a group of guys who considered themselves to be oh-so-enlightened the sexism of the beats certainly does make you cringe and ...more
updated Nov 14, 2009 07:22pm

Jul 11, 2011

Nate rated it

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Recommends it for: teens who need to be prodded out into the universe

Recommended to Nate by: highway lines converging at the bleary horizon

I notice that many of the 4 or 5 star On the Road reviews on here, especially among my contacts, start with the caveat that they're rating based on their first reading of this book as a teen. As such, I definitely should have read this as a teen, rather than picking it up for the first time now. The best aspects would certainly have spoken to me (they still do):
-the exhilaration
-the sense of possibility
-the call of sheer wide-eyed experience
-the exuberance of a sprawli...moreI notice that many of the 4 or 5 star On the Road reviews on here, especially among my contacts, start with the caveat that they're rating based on their first reading of this book as a teen. As such, I definitely should have read this as a teen, rather than picking it up for the first time now. The best aspects would certainly have spoken to me (they still do):
-the exhilaration
-the sense of possibility
-the call of sheer wide-eyed experience
-the exuberance of a sprawling American landscape rolling away in every direction.
On the other hand, I just got back from spending my own month on the road, so some of these random locations are still fresh in my mind (I know for instance that Central City, Colorado is all casinos now, which makes reading of it in Kerouac's time pretty interesting.)

The downside of all this are the already well-noted Kerouac flaws:
-the sometimes rushed or iffy writing ("Things were going on wild as ever outside, except that the fat burpers were getting drunker and whooping it up louder. It was funny.")
-the self-aggrandizing
-the way female characters are basically non-entities, often nameless, depthless objects of desire or annoyance

This latter is ultimately the most annoying part to me. Even the Bukowski I've read seems less sexist somehow, because with Bukowski there's a sort of acknowledgment that everything is obviously desperate and pathetic and horrible, whereas Kerouac seems to be aiming for a kind of ideal. Still, all of that was far far worse to me in Dharma Bums, where all these self-involved characters couldn't stop discussing how enlightened they were. Here, at least, these lives are rawer and further out on the fringe and seemingly less idealized. Plus, the best parts of Dharma were the travel sequences, and this is essentially all travel.

I guess one of the unspoken factors coloring my experience here is the fact that this is essentially a memoir. Maybe its a bit of an assumption or reduction, but it's also the common assumption attached to Kerouac's writing. And this certainly reads more like a travelogue than it does a novel. I don't particularly like memoirs in general (you need a really good reason to justify writing one to me) and I especially don't like reading memoirs of people I don't especially like.

Sorry, sorry. Another friend on here claims to "irrationally hate anyone who doesn't love or at least grudgingly respect this book." And I do have a grudging respect for it, for the above reasons and for its core drive to see and engage with the world. This impulse is at heart a very good and important one, and if this book has inspired it in a few of its readers over the years (and it certainly has inspired many), Kerouac has accomplished something worthwhile. And I can respect that even through my other frustrations. I, however, don't really need Kerouac to awaken these sensations in me. I already have my own.(less)

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About Jack Kerouac

Jack Kerouac was an American novelist, writer, poet, and artist. He is perhaps the best known of a group of writers and friends who came to be known as the Beat Generation, a term he himself created.

Kerouac's work was popular, but received little critical acclaim during his lifetime. Today, he is considered an important and influential writer who inspired others, including Tom Robbins,...more

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Quotes from On the Road

“the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes 'Awww!' What did they call such young people in Goethe's Germany?” — 2,662 people liked it

“Nothing behind me, everything ahead of me, as is ever so on the road.” — 762 people liked it

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