Jack Kerouac Essay Research Paper In the

Jack Kerouac Essay, Research Paper

In the beginning Jack Kerouac lived a wild and exciting life outside the realm of

everyday "normal" American life. Though On the Road and The Dharma Bums were

Kerouac’s only commercial sucesses, he was a man who changed American literature and

pop-culture. Kerouac virtually created a life-style devoted to life, art, literature, music,

and poetry. When his movement grew out of his control, he came to despise it, and died

lonely on the other side of what he once loved and cherished above all else. But, on the

way he created a style of writing which combined elements of all the great writers, with

speed, common language, real people, and the reality of his life.

In a public junior high school he began to read feverishly. In English classes he

flourished, but socially he did not. Impressed deeply by Mark Twain and Jack London,

Kerouac created his own imaginary world, which he recorded in hand-written

"newspapers." These led to his first "novel" Jack Kerouac Explores the Merrimack,

which he wrote in a notebook at the age of twelve (Clark, 22).

Skipping classes at Lowell High School, in Lowell Massachusetts, Kerouac was

exposed to the work of Thomas Wolfe by a fellow student Sammy Sampas. They

encouraged writing in each other, and Kerouac began writing seriously. Since the

Kerouacs could not afford college, a local priest suggested he try for a football

scholarship (Clark, 32). He was offered two; one from Colombia University and the

other from Boston College.

Kerouac opted for Columbia and first spent one year, by the request of the

university, at the Horace Mann School for Boys. Here he didn’t fit in with the rich prep-

school crowd, but he was exposed to Hemmingway (Clark, 37). Here, also, in a school

publication his work was first printed (Clark, 39).

After two years of school at Columbia Kerouac made a decision that would

change his life. He always believed he learned more outside of the classroom than in; and

so after a series of arguments with his coach, he quit the team. Not long after he dropped

out of school as well. He served briefly in the navy, and drinking heavily, was discharged

on psychiatric grounds(Clark, 52). Upon his return home he got a job with as a Merchant

Marine. When he wasn’t working he spent his time with Allen Ginsberg, Lucien Carr,

William S. Burroughs, and Neal Cassady (Jack Kerouac, 1). His family’s disapproval of

his friends led him to a life balancing his friends and family. This is recorded in The

Town and the City, a novel which Ginsberg’s professors got published.

Not long after Kerouac began making the now famous series of cross-country trips

with Cassady immortalized in On the Road (On the Road). But it would be seven years

before On the Road would be published (Jack Kerouac, 2). During these trips Kerouac

made several literary discoveries that changed the American Novel. First and foremost he

developed a "sketching" style of writing, inspired by an artist friend named Ed White and

the speed of bop music. Here the main goal was to write on the spot. This became what

he called "the great moment of discovering my soul," (Clark, 102).

Later this "sketching" developed into a style of writing unlike any other. He

would write either on the spot or from memory, but always on many levels; imagination

and reality, psychic and social, poetry and narrative, but always complete honesty. To

Kerouac this was "the only way to write." This style is evident first in Visions of Cody,

Kerouac’s tribute to Cassady (Clark, 110).

In 1952 Kerouac lived briefly in Mexico City with Burroughs. Here he wrote Dr.

Sax, which was considered shocking even by Ginsberg who told Kerouac it would never

be published because it was "so personal, so full of sex language," (Clark, 115). Later

Kerouac said Ginsberg was mishandling his career and didn’t take advantage of the sex

and drug revolution that was sweeping the country in paperbacks(Clark, 117). Ginsberg

was wrong though. Dr. Sax was published, but not until 1959 (Clark, xvii).

That fall he took a job with the Southern Pacific rail road. On the trains he

developed another adaptation to his writing style. He called this "speed writing" which

was supposed to "clack along all the way like a steam engine pulling a 100-car freight

with a talky caboose at the end." He also became well practiced in describing the

American land-scape, to the point where it almost becomes more of a character than a

setting (Clark,118).

The job on the rail road, and his writing led him to an isolation that brought a

beauty to his writing similar to Dickinson. This is very evident when comparing On the

Road with later works such as The Dharma Bums and Big Sur. But, Ginsberg believed

the isolation was making him too focused on "self as subject ma

Внимание, отключите Adblock

Вы посетили наш сайт со включенным блокировщиком рекламы!
Ссылка для скачивания станет доступной сразу после отключения Adblock!

Скачать