One of my frequent commenters, Mortalterror, wrote this glowing review of Keroauc’s On the Road, “I also thought it was one of the best books I’ve ever read. I felt enthralled by Kerouac’s narrative voice, caught up in the energy, and the raw will to live, the exuberance of his characters. I’ve loaned copies to friends and they’ve all loved it as well.”
One might ask why am I starting my post with someone else’s viewpoint of the book? And the answer is that I didn’t really like the novel much myself and I wanted to show what others find endearing about it. Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t hate the book; it even has some charming episodes, but love it I did not. If it is said that if you don’t appreciate a certain classic you need to try reading it again when you’re older, but I’m wondering if this a book I needed to read when I was younger to appreciate more.
The story is about a group of hitchhiking intellectuals–proto-hippies who travel across the country while enjoying sex, drugs, alcohol, and new experiences in different American cities. In particular, the story is about the friendship between Sal Paradise, a restless college student, and Dean Moriarty, a selfish and irresponsible petty criminal turned intellectual. The novel is divided into four separate road trips and told from Sal Paradise’s point-of-view.
As MortalTerror noted in his review, the main appeal is the kind of raw spirit and energy the characters have for life. They have a palpable zest for life and new experiences that defines and shapes their characters and permeates every page. Even when characters come close to running out of money, with the potential to starve out in the streets, they never worry too much and go out to party. I think the allure of such a novel is that in contrast to a great deal of other literature that often suggests life is difficult, full of pain, struggles, and hardship, this novel is mostly positive and upbeat in its tone. And I admit while reading this novel I did sometimes find myself wanting to travel and explore America.
On the other hand, there isn’t much of an overall plot or conflict or framework. If there is a framework at all it is that he takes for road trips, loosely connected through his insatiable desire to wander and reoccurring characters that pop up to stoke that desire to travel. It is very episodic in nature. Some of these episodes are quite good like when he explores a relationship with a Mexican woman named Inez and his stint working as an officer at a barracks for workers being shipped off to Japan, others feel repetitive and weren’t as interesting to me. This made for a novel where I found myself sometimes engaged when I liked a particular episode in the plot and other times bored and slogging through the pages; unfortunately, the latter occurred more than the former.
Since this novel is supposed to be based on adventures Kerouac (Sal Paradise) had in real life with Neal Cassady (Dean), I wonder if having more knowledge about their lives adds to the experience of reading the novel. If I were to take a stab at why I didn’t love the novel, I would say that I found it to be a pointless travelogue with little overarching plot structure and only a few short interesting episodes, full of characters who pop in and out (like Carlo Marx), but who otherwise play no significant role as the narrative unfolds, all told with a writing style that while spontaneous can be irritatingly unrefined. I know a lot of people love this novel and those most fanatical in their praise will probably think I’m some idiotic jerk who just didn’t get its brilliance; nevertheless, I did want to give my honest reactions to it, and while I didn’t hate it, I can’t say I loved it either.
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August 15, 2011 at 12:24 am
mortalterror
It’s not really about the plot. It’s about the voice. You have to recall that this book was written in the age of stylists such as Hemingway, Faulkner, Fitzgerald, Nabokov, Proust, and Joyce. I think his actual narrative style is as good as any of them, in this novel, not in his others which were generally much less successful. Then you have his pacing, which is something that literary writers generally stink at while pulp writers excel at. The book just moves, and you turn pages, and you can’t put it down for long periods of time, is what I mean. It’s just absorbing like The Three Musketeers. Then you have that stream of consciousness effect which writers since the modern age are always striving for and never achieving, the authenticity and psychology of the characters, their exotic nature seasoned with a bit of humor. You can tell that the writer genuinely likes these people and that makes you like them too. They are very upbeat and positive, full of a life and energy which makes them compelling like Falstaff or Zorba the Greek.
September 12, 2011 at 2:07 pm
Marie
I can completely sympathise with your opinion of On The Road, and it’s nice to read something honest about a classic that people say that they love because they feel that they ought to.
I read this book a few years back, and so it’s not as fresh in my memory as I’d like. I took it on holiday with me, but it wasn’t a particularly effortless read, it was fairly arduous in fact, but I remained compelled.
I personally think that Keroac was a genius of sorts, and I read this novel in the context of the other ‘Beat’ works. I agree that some insight into the Beat Generation, and the writers involved (Allen Ginsberg and William S. Burroughs), makes it a much more interesting read.
The novel also has an interesting back story, written in 3 weeks on a 120-foot long roll of paper, known as the scroll.
Marie / Little Interpretations
December 31, 2011 at 4:55 am
End of the Year Summary: Book List 2011 « Beyond Assumptions
[...] R. R. Martin (link) 26. The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka (link) 27. On the Road by Jack Kerouac (link) 28. The Inferno by Dante Alighieri (link) 29. The Purgatorio by Dante Alighieri (link) 30. The [...]