Fifty years later, 'On the Road' still beckons
Young people are still drawn to Jack Kerouac's novel, but these days they're not as likely to set out on their own.
from the September 5, 2007 edition
Page 3 of 3
Adam Forguites, a house painter and musician in Burlington, Vt., who read "On the Road" when he was 15, wants Kerouac's influence on youth to be stronger. "What's interesting to me about the young people of right now – this generation – is that they are defined by a lack of rebellion. They don't rebel against the status quo, and I find that troubling. They should all read Kerouac."
Kerouac's appeal to youth will endure, especially among adventure-seeking teenage males, say Beat scholars. But rebellion won't be his lasting legacy, says Bill Lawlor, professor of English at the University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point: "If young readers come to Kerouac looking for excitement and thrill, and that's all that they look for, they may or may not be satisfied." As time passes, he notes, the exploits of Kerouac's characters seem more and more dated to young people. "If readers instead look for an overall appreciation of America, Kerouac's influence is more likely to endure."
Readers like Mr. Forguites agree. "What's relevant about Kerouac is love: Love of the country, love of the landscape, love of the totality of experience of American culture – the sense in his work of wanting to see it all and love it all. That's the strain that's good for future generations."
Who was Jack Kerouac?
Jack Kerouac's "On the Road" is celebrated for its spontaneous prose style that mimics the rhythms of bebop music and for its commentary on postwar America. Mr. Kerouac was born in 1922 to French-Canadian immigrants in the blue-collar town of Lowell, Mass. He won a football scholarship to Columbia University at age 17, but dropped out at the start of his sophomore year. "He was supposed to be the American Dream," says Ronna Johnson, a Kerouac scholar at Tufts University in Somerville, Mass. "But it wasn't a fully satisfying direction." Until his death at age 47, Kerouac struggled with alcoholism and financial hardship.
Kerouac helped define what it was to be "Beat" – wide-eyed, individualistic, and "beaten down" by the conventional pursuit of a steady job and a mortgage. His contemporaries included such anti-establishment poets and writers as Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs, and Herbert Huncke, all of whose work was characterized by collaboration across jazz, art, and poetry.
"On the Road" is Kerouac's semiautobiographical tale of two young men who travel across postwar America, exploring its seamy underbelly, living recklessly, and meeting intriguing characters. His other books include: "The Town and the City" (1949), "The Subterraneans" (1953), "The Dharma Bums" (1957), and "Big Sur" (1961).
RSS feed
