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Title: On the Road by Jack Kerouac, David Carradine ISBN: 0-453-00830-5 Publisher: Penguin Audiobooks Pub. Date: June, 1993 Format: Audio Cassette Volumes: 2 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.01 (467 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: True yesterday, true today, true tomorrow
Comment: Sal Paradise is a writer just like Kerouac who decides to 'see America'. He hitches rides, washes dishes, works on farms, sleeps on floors and under the stars, experiencing new flavors of life and meeting different kinds of people he never thought existed. It is a kaleidoscopic journey across this country, not some plastic trip on flying tin cans, staying in gaudy hotels, hobnobbing with phony people and walking through tourist traps in line with the flock. He meets other writers just like himself coming and going 'On The Road' who convey their own experiences and enrich Sal's ever more in the process.
The conflict comes in the figure of Dean Moriarty, a hustler and con man who the beatniks first embrace as one of their own, but eventually identify for what he is after patterns begin to emerge in his relationships with his peers. Sal at first sees Dean as a hero, a role model, but slowly grows disillusioned with broken promises, threadbare lies, irresponsible behavior, and eventual deceit and betrayal. The whole story is focused on Sal and Dean, and just as the two go off on a tangent down into Mexico and on into Central America, it seems analogous as to how Sal's vision become blurred and misdirected in following an agenda he mistakenly believes to be his own.
This is probably the best book written on the Beat Generation, capturing the essence of the times and the spirit that established what became the underground culture of America. Teens and young adults having trouble articulating their deepest feelings may find that Kerouac did it for them almost a half century ago. Don't miss it! Along with this great novel, I'd also like to recommend, THE LOSERS' CLUB by Richard Perez
Rating: 5
Summary: A 20th Century Classic
Comment: In a time reverse way, I felt dated, reading this very modern piece of writing with my postmodern consciousness. At first I felt like I was in the ejector seat of a convertible without seatbelts doing 110 MPG with a drugged or drunk driver commandeering the steering wheel. Well, we the readers, not to mention the characters, are. But all the boozing, drugs, women, and breaking of various Commandments don't have the consequences we'd expect in a more recent novel. Instead, we learn about the holy pursuit of getting high on life, especially as it is lived on the edge. A gang of characters is wrapped like a hurricane's winds around Dean Moriarty whose bipolar (postmodern judgment there) energy flows inspire antic cross country road trips across several years. In a book that's fueled by organic movement, there comes the day when the characters have to move on and away after they have achieved the highest (literally) point in their travels, and that's the ultimate consequence, that the momentum dissipates.
I had put off reading this book, thinking I couldn't handle one long abstract rant, which it isn't, though I'd picked up that impression somewhere. Kerouac sings like Whitman in a voice that is at once poetic and yet concretely journalistic. It is urgent, thus propelling its content, peeling away the past and future. There is artistic skill and knowledge at work in every sentence.
I read the critical introduction last, so it would not color my experience. It is an excellent introduction, one addressing more autobiographical detail than text, but all the same, read it as an afterward; I think Kerouac would want you to live the book unfettered by context.
Rating: 5
Summary: A potential life changing experience
Comment: I'm realatively new to literature...partly because the books I was forced to read at an early age disinterested me completely. However, this book alone has instilled within me a whole new passion for the written word. Kerouac's style captivated me from the first sentence read and propelled me to a whole new world where I became thoroughly acquaited with Sal, Dean, and friends to the extent that I also felt part of the story. I especially recommend this book to anyone who has a passion for travelling. I absolutely garantee that you will gain a similar appreciation for this work.
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Title: Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac ISBN: 0140042520 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: February, 1991 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe ISBN: 0553380648 Publisher: Bantam Pub. Date: 05 October, 1999 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs ISBN: 0802132952 Publisher: Grove Press Pub. Date: February, 1992 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: Howl and Other Poems by Allen Ginsberg, William Carlos Williams ISBN: 0872860175 Publisher: City Lights Books Pub. Date: July, 1991 List Price(USD): $5.95 |
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Title: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas : A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream by Hunter S. Thompson, Hunter S. Thompson, Ralph Steadman ISBN: 0679785892 Publisher: Vintage Books Pub. Date: 12 May, 1998 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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