Satori in Paris & Pic

by Jack Kerouac

I want to tell them that we dont all want to become ants contributing to the social body, but individualists each one counting one by one, but no, try to tell that to the in-and-outers rushing in and out the humming world night as the world turns on one axis. The secret storm has become a public tempest.

I’d-a done better staying home and painting the “Mystical Marriage of St. Catherine” after Girolamo Romanino but I’m so enslaved to yak and tongue, paint bores me, and it takes a lifetime to learn how to paint.

Naturally, being in Paris I wanta play some pool with the local talent and test Wits Transatlantique but they’re not interested—

I suddenly longed to go to England as she began to rattle off that there were only manuscripts in the National Archives and a lot of them had been burned in the Nazi bombing and besides they had no records there of “les affaires Colonielles” (Colonial matters).

And for me, an American, to handle manuscripts there, if any relating to my problem, what difference did it make?

I went, on somebody’s tip, to the Bibliothèque Mazarine near Quai St. Michel and nothing happened there either except the old lady librarian winked at me, gave me her name (Madame Oury), and told me to write to her anytime.

I bought an air ticket to Brest, Brittany.

All there was to do in Paris was done. I bought an air ticket to Brest, Brittany. Went down to the bar to say goodbye to everybody and one of them, Goulet the Breton said, “Be careful, they’ll keep you there!” p.s. As one last straw, before buying the ticket, I went over to my French publishers and announced my name and asked for the boss—The girl either believed that I was one of the authors of the house, which I am to the tune of six novels now, or not, but she coldly said that he was out to lunch—

this imperious secretary who must’ve thought she was very Madame Defarge herself in Dickens’ “Tale of Two Cities” sewing the names of potential guillotine victims into the printer’s cloth,

“It aint watcha do It’s the way atcha do it!”

OVER AT GARE ST.-LAZARE I BOUGHT AN AIR-INTER ticket one-way to Brest

OVER AT GARE ST.-LAZARE I BOUGHT AN AIR-INTER ticket one-way to Brest (not heeding Goulet’s advice) and cashed a travellers check of $50 (big deal) and went to my hotel room and spent two hours repacking so everything’d be alright and checking the rug on the floor for any lints I mighta left, and went down all dolled up (shaved etc.) and said goodbye to the evil woman and the nice man her husband who ran the hotel, with my hat on now, the rain hat I intended to wear on the midnight sea rocks, always wore it pulled down over the left eye I guess because that’s the way I wore my pea cap in the Navy—There were no great outcries of please come back but the desk clerk observed me as tho he was like to try me sometime.

by the time I get there the plane is out taxiing to the runway, the ramp’s been rolled back which all those traitors just crept up, and off they go to Brittany with my suitcase.

“I’m going to follow them in a train! Can you sell me a train ticket? They took off with my valise!”

But I go in a taxi 15 miles back to Gare Montparnasse and I buy a one-way ticket to Brest, first class,

I know instinctively I’ll choose the second compartment—And I do! Because what do I see in there but “Le Rouge et le Noire” (The Red and the Black), that is to say, the Military and the Church, a French soldier and a Catholic priest,

Now this is the real way to go to Brittany, gents.

his hands are trembling as if from ague and for all I know from Pascalian ache for the equation of the Absolute or maybe Pascal scared him and the other Jesuits with his bloody “Provincial Letters,”

BUT THE POOR LITTLE PRIEST, DARK, SHALL WE SAY swart, or swartz, and very small and thin, his hands are trembling as if from ague and for all I know from Pascalian ache for the equation of the Absolute or maybe Pascal scared him and the other Jesuits with his bloody “Provincial Letters,” but in any case I look into his dark brown eyes, I see his weird little parroty understanding of everything and of me too, and I pound my collarbone with my finger and say: “I’m Catholic too.” He nods. “I wear the Sacred Queen and also St. Benedict.” He nods. He is such a little guy you could blow him away with one religious yell like “O Seigneur!” (Oh Lord!)

“Ah, that’s Breton. You live in Rennes?”

I say my name to the guy in the corner (like I said I would). “Ah, that’s Breton. You live in Rennes?” “No I live in Florida in America but I was born etc. etc.” the whole long story, which interests them,

I didnt even have a chance to look out the window as we passed the Chartres Cathedral with the dissimilar towers one five hundred years older’n the other.

“Il est malade, il à un rheum,” (He’s sick, he’s got a cold) I told Noblet grandly. The Soldier was laughing all the while.

WHAT GETS ME IS THAT, AFTER AN HOUR NOBLET and I were waving our wine bottles across the poor priest’s face as we argued religion, history, politics, so suddenly I turned to him trembling there and asked: “Do you mind our wine bottles?” He gave me a look as if to say: “You mean that lil ole winemaker me? No, no, I have a cold, you see, I feel awful sick.” “Il est malade, il à un rheum,” (He’s sick, he’s got a cold) I told Noblet grandly. The Soldier was laughing all the while.

No applause from the priest, but a side under-look, brief, like the look of an applauder, thank God.

I said grandly to them all (and the English translation is beneath this):- “Jésu à été cru-cifié parce que, a place d’amenez l’argent et le pouvoir, il à amenez seulement l’ assurance que l’existence a été formez par le Bon Dieu et elle appartiens an Bon Dieu le Pêre, et Lui, le Pêre, va nous élever au Ciel après la mort, ou parsonne n’aura besoin d’argent ou de pouvoir parce que ça c’est seulement après tout d’la poussière et de la rouille—Nous autres qu’ils n’ont pas vue les miracles de Jésu, comme les Juifs et les Romans et la ’tites poignée d’Grecs et d’autres de la riviêre Nile et Euphrates, on à seulement de continuer d’accepter l’assurance qu’il nous a été descendu dans la parole sainte du nouveau testament—C’est pareille comme ci, en voyant quelqu’un, on dira ’c’est pas lui, c’est pas lui!’ sans savoir QUI est lui, et c’est seulement le Fils qui connaient le Père—Alors, la Foi, et l’Église quiàdéfendu la Foi comme qu’a pouva.” (Partly French Canuck.) IN ENGLISH:– “Jesus was crucified because, instead of bringing money and power, He only brought the assurance that existence was created by God and it belongs to God the Father, and He, the Father, is going to elevate us to Heaven after death, where no one will need money or power because that’s only after all dust and rust—We who have not seen the Miracles of Jesus, like the Jews and the Romans and the little handful of Greeks and others from the Nile River and the Euphrates, only have to continue accepting the assurance which has been handed down to us in the Holy Writ of the New Testament—It’s just as though, on seeing someone, we’d say ‘It’s not him, it’s not him!’ without knowing WHO he is, and it’s only the Son who knows the Father—Therefore, Faith, and the Church which defended the Faith as well as it could.” No applause from the priest, but a side under-look, brief, like the look of an applauder, thank God.

WAS THAT MY SATORI, THAT LOOK, OR NOBLET?

He led me off the train, after the others, and walked me down the steaming station platform, stopped me at a liquor man so I could buy me a flask of cognac for the rest of the ride, and said goodbye:

the Bretons were against the Revolutionaries who were atheists and headcutters for fraternal reasons, while the Bretons had paternal reasons to keep to their old way of life.

he was home, in Rennes, and so was the priest and the soldier, Rennes the former capital of all Brittany, seat of an Archbishop, headquarters of the 10th Army Corps, with the university and many schools, but not the real deep Brittany because in 1793 it was the headquarters of the Republican Army of the French Revolution against the Vendéans further in. And has ever since then been made the tribunal watchdog over those wild dog places. La Vendée, the name of the war between those two forces in history, was this:– the Bretons were against the Revolutionaries who were atheists and headcutters for fraternal reasons, while the Bretons had paternal reasons to keep to their old way of life.

Trainman, seeing nobody’s getting much off or on, the lonely platform, repeats, advising me how to pronounce these Breton names: “Saint Brrieu!”

I GET PRETTY FRIENDLY WITH THE YOUNG COUPLE and at St. Brieuc the trainman yells out “Saint Brrieu!“—I yell out “S a i n t B r i e u c k!” Trainman, seeing nobody’s getting much off or on, the lonely platform, repeats, advising me how to pronounce these Breton names: “Saint Brrieu!” “Saint Brieuck!” I yell, emphasizing as you see the “c” noise of the thing there. “Saint Brrieu!” “Saint Brieuck!” “Saint Brrieu!” “Saint Brrieuck!” “Saint Brrrieu!” “Saint Brrrieuck!” Here he realizes he’s dealing with a maniack and quits the game with me and it’s a wonder I didn’t get thrown off the train right there on the wild shore here called Coasts of the North (Côtes du Nord) but he didnt even bother, after all the Little Prince had his firstclass ticket and Little Prick more likely.

I still insist, when you’re in Brittany (Armorica the ancient name), land of Kelts, pronounce your “K’s” with a kuck

We finally arrive in Brest, end of the line, no more land,

Cognacs, beers, and then I ask where’s the hotel,

Unshaven, in a black raincoat with rain hat, dirty, I walk outa there and go sploopsing up dark streets looking like any decent American Boy in trouble, old or young, for the Main Drag—

But I’m not a Buddhist, I’m a Catholic revisiting the ancestral land that fought for Catholicism against impossible odds yet won in the end, as certes, at dawn, I’ll hear the tolling of the tocsin churchbells for the dead.

Meanwhile the young bartender is also glad to talk to me, has apparently heard of my books,

Miraculously, yet, I suddenly passed a band of twelve or so Naval inductees who were singing a martial song in chorus on the foggy corner.

Miraculously, yet, I suddenly passed a band of twelve or so Naval inductees who were singing a martial song in chorus on the foggy corner. I went right up to em, looked at the head singer, and with me alcoholic hoarse baritone went “A a a a a a h”—They waited— “V é é é é” They wondered who this nut was. “M a h-r e e e e e-e e—ee—aaaah!” Ah, Ave Maria, on the next notes I knew not the words but just sang the melody and they caught on, caught up the tune, and there we were a chorus with baritone and tenors singing like sad angels suddenly slowly—And right through the whole first chorus—In the foggy foggy dew—Brest Brittany—Then I said “Adieu” and walked away. They never said a word. Some nut with a raincoat and a hat.

I had come to France and Brittany just to look up this old name of mine which is just about three thousand years old and was never changed in all that time, as who would change a name that simply means House (Ker), In the Field (Ouac) —

I only wanted to find out why my family never changed their name and perchance find a tale there,

NOW I’M GETTING SCARED, I SUSPECT SOME OF THOSE guys crisscrossing the streets in front of my wandering path are fixing to mug me for my two or three hundred bucks left—

NOW I’M GETTING SCARED, I SUSPECT SOME OF THOSE guys crisscrossing the streets in front of my wandering path are fixing to mug me for my two or three hundred bucks left—It’s foggy and still except for sudden squeek wheels of cars loaded with guys, no girls now—I get mad and go up to an apparent elderly printer hurrying home from work or cardgame, maybe my father’s ghost, as surely my father musta looked down on me that night in Brittany at last where he and all his brothers and uncles and their fathers had all longed to go, and only poor Ti Jean finally made it and poor Ti Jean with his Swiss Army knife in the suitcase locked in an airfield twenty miles away across the moors—He, Ti Jean, threatened now not by Bretons, as on those tourney mornings when flags and public women made fight an honorable thing I guess, but in Apache alleys the slur of Wallace Beery and worse than that of course, a thin mustache and a thin blade or a small nickel plated gun—No garrottes please, I’ve got my armor on, my Reichian character armor that is—How easy to joke about it as I scribble this 4,500 miles away safe at home in old Florida with the doors locked and the Sheriff doin his best in a town at least as bad but not as foggy and so dark—

Am I crazy? Crazy as that raccoon in Big Sur Woods, or the sandpiper thereof, or any Olsky-Polsky Sky Bum, or Route Sixty Six Silly Elephant Eggplant Sycophant and with more to come.

“this trunk of humours” as Shakespeare said of Falstaff, this false staff not even a prophet let alone a knight,

The gendarmes have a school of their own,

The gendarmes have a school of their own, meaning, they dont accept bribes or tips, they say with their eyes: “To each his own, you with your fifty francs, me with my honorable civic courage—and civil at that.”

Boom, he drives me to a little Breton inn on Rue Victor Hugo.

The bed is perfect with seventeen layers of blankets over sheets and I sleep for three hours and suddenly they’re yelling and scrambling for breakfast again with shouts across courtyards, bing, bang, clatter of pots and shoes dropping on the second floor, cocks crowing, it’s France and morning—

Here’s your beer, voila, I’ll keep the coffee hot on the stove.”

When I come out I am trying to get to my sink in my room to comb my hair but he’s already got breakfast coming for me in the diningroom where nobody is but us— “Wait, comb my hair, get my cigarettes, and, ah, how about a beer first?” “Wa? You crazy? Have your coffee first, your bread and butter.” “Just a little beer.” “A Wright, awright, just one—Sit here when you get back, I’ve got work to do in the kitchen.” But this is all spoken that fast and even, but in Breton French which I dont have to make an effort like I do in Parisian French, to enunciate: just: “Ey, weyondonc, pourquoi t’a peur que j’m’dégrise avec une ’tite bierre?” (Hey, come on, how come you’re scared of me sobering up with a little beer?) “On s’dégrise pas avec la bierre, Monsieur, mais avec le bon petit dejeuner.” (We dont sober up with beer, Monsieur, but with a nice breakfast.) “Way, mais on est pas toutes des soulons.” (Yah, but not everybody’s a drunk.) “Dont talk like that Monsieur. It’s there, look, here, in the good Breton butter made with cream, and bread fresh from the baker, and strong hot coffee, that’s how we sober up—Here’s your beer, voila, I’ll keep the coffee hot on the stove.”

“But I havent learned French in books but at home, I didnt know how to speak English in America before I was, oh, five six years old, my parents were born in Canada in Québec, the name of my mother is L’Évêsque.”

Satori there in Victor Hugo Inn?

“Well pay your room bill and go down rue Victor Hugo, on the corner is cognac, go get your valise and settle your affairs and come back here find out if there’s a room tonight, beyond that old buddy old Neal Cassady cant go no further.

and Ker-thatter behind the bar, gives me a cold gyrene look gyring me wide around and I say “Cognac, Monsieur.”

(They had some brands there besides Hennessey and Courvoisier and Monnet, that musta been why Winston Churchill that old Baron crying for his hounds in his weird wield weir, was always in France with cigar-a-mouth painting.)

NOW I SEE THE HARBOR, THE FLOWERPOTS IN BACK of kitchens, old Brest, the boats, coupla tankers out there, and the wild headlands in the gray scudding sky, summat like Nova Scotia.

“Alright, so I’ll fly to Paris. What time today?” “Not today. Monday is the next flight from Brest.”

Is there a train back to Paris?” “Yes, at three.”

it doesnt matter how charming cultures and art are, they’re useless without sympathy—All the prettiness of tapestries, lands, people:– worthless if there is no sympathy—Poets of genius are just decorations on the wall if without the poetry of kindness and Caritas—

Whatever wrong you do shall be returned to you a hundredfold, jot and tittle, by the laws that operate in what science now calls “the deepening mystery of research.”