On the Road by Jack Kerouac A classic literary chronicle of American restlessness
What's it about?
On the Road (1957) is the defining novel of the Beat generation, written by one of its greatest minds. Based loosely on the lives and travels of the author himself, it follows young writer Sal Paradise and his reckless new friend Dean Moriarty on their wild journeys through America of the late 1940s. Their aimless wanderings lead the young rebels down winding paths of sex and drugs, love and despair – filled with surprising poetry.
Published in 1957, Jack Kerouac's autobiographical novel arrived like a manifesto for the Beat Generation – an infamous group of writers and artists rejecting conformity in favor of spontaneity, jazz, and restless spiritual wanderings.
Written in a three-week burst on a continuous scroll of paper, the novel's breathless, improvisational prose mirrors the frantic cross-country journeys it describes. It made Jack Kerouac an overnight sensation, scandalizing mainstream America while electrifying young readers hungry for alternatives to suburban domesticity.
In this lesson, you'll follow young writer Sal Paradise and his enigmatic friend Dean Moriarty in a story that became the blueprint for counterculture movements to come, inspiring everyone from hippies to punk rockers.
It's the winter of 1947 in New York City. Our narrator, a young writer named Sal Paradise, is just getting over a bad breakup. That's when he first encounters the enigmatic Dean Moriarty. A friend of a friend, Dean just got out of jail and supposedly wants to become a writer like himself. He's visiting the big city with his new wife Marylou, working as a parking lot attendant to make ends meet.
Sal first visits Dean in the couple's rundown apartment in Harlem. He encounters a frenetic young man full of ideas and desires. They spend a typical New York night out with their friends, drinking, smoking, listening to jazz music and talking until the early dawn.
One night shortly after, Dean shows up at Sal's door unannounced. He's had a big fight with Marylou and is now running from the police. Sal, intrigued by Dean, lets him live with him at his aunt's place. Over time, Sal grows enamored with Dean’s insatiable lust for life – so unlike the contrarian posturing of his intellectual friends. Before long, Dean becomes an emblematic figure for him: a true man of the road, and a veritable lunatic to match.
In spring, Dean decides that his first stint in New York is over. He wants to head back to his hometown Denver. Sal decides to save up some money and follow his new friend West. So in the summer of 1948, with 50 bucks in his pocket, Sal hits Route 6 to make it across the country. He takes a bus to Chicago, from where he begins to hitchhike, sustaining himself on apple pie and ice cream from cheap diners – which he swears keep getting better the further he ventures out West.
Sal hitches a ride from several road-worn truck drivers before catching "the greatest ride of his life" with two happy-go-lucky young farmers. Picking up every hitchhiker they come across on their way to Los Angeles, the back of the farmer's flatboard truck is crowded with fellow adventurers. Sal meets a sneaky-looking fella named "Montana Slim" and a kind hobo he calls "Mississippi Gene" with a silent young companion. The travelers on board spend the journey drinking, smoking and joking around. In the night, lying on the back of the truck and gazing at the stars up above, Sal is filled with a true sense of freedom and adventure. His journey West has begun.
In Denver, Sal boards up with another writer friend, Roland Major. But for the first few days, the elusive Dean is nowhere to be found. Finally, Sal receives a call from their mutual friend Carlo Marx. Carlo and Dean are both in Denver, but Dean has been busy juggling his new affair with a girl called Camille while simultaneously rekindling his relationship with Marylou. In between, the friends are experimenting with opiates and going to drag races.
Finally, Sal, Dean and Carlo reunite for a night about town. Dean even picks up a girl for Sal, but they end up staying out so late Roland Major won't let him back into the house. Their partying life continues for a while, Sal often finding himself in the role of passive observer to Dean's ravenous appetite for life and his endless ramblings.
Yet hints of sadness glint through the rambunctious facade of the friends' exploits. Sal can finally convince a girl to sleep with him, but she appears unimpressed. He's growing restless again. Having received some more money from his aunt, he decides to move on to San Francisco.
Just outside the big city, Sal moves in with his old friend Remi Boncoeur and his girlfriend Lee Ann. He gets a taste of the real world when Remi gets him a job as a nightguard at a barrack for construction workers. But tensions between the friends are slowly growing. Money is always tight, and Remi senses that Sal likes Lee Ann a little too much. To Sal, California appears increasingly empty and sad. When he shows up late and drunk to a dinner with Remi's stepfather, their friendship essentially implodes.
Craving movement, Sal decides to return East. On the bus to LA, he meets a pretty Mexican girl named Terry. They end up coupling up, but LA proves to be brutal. Sal only has twenty dollars left, and neither of them can find any work. So they travel to Terry's hometown in Sabinal, where he meets her brother, friends, and her seven-year-old son. The little make-shift family rent a tent near the cotton fields. For a while, Sal enjoys his new role as a husband, father and cotton picker. He finds a strange solace in the attitude of warm hopelessness embraced by Terry and her family. But eventually, the road calls him again. He spends his last money on a bus to Pittsburgh. Although Terry promises to visit him in NYC, they both know she won't make it.
Sal's journey back home is arduous – from Pittsburgh onwards, he has to hitchhike, relying on the kindness of strangers to buy him food. He arrives back in New York haggard and exhausted, where he learns that Dean has moved to San Francisco with his new girl Camille.
Over the next year, Sal finds his way back into regular life. He returns to school on the GI Bill and meets a girl named Lucille, whom he hopes to marry. But predictably, Dean pops back into Sal's life just as it seems stabilized. When Sal is celebrating Christmas 1948 with relatives in Virginia, Dean shows up at the doorstep, wired and unshaven. He has just left Camille and his new baby daughter in San Francisco. Marylou and Ed Dunkel are with him, a friend who also just ditched his wife.
Dean appears madder than ever. Before he knows it, he has dragged Sal back on the road. In New York, they reunite with old friends and party to Bop music all through New Year's weekend.
Sal's girlfriend Lucille immediately dislikes Dean, and Sal senses their relationship crumbling. He secretly likes Marylou, who's been flirting with him. But when Dean proposes that Sal make love to her in front of him, he finds himself too shy. Their old friend Carlo Marx has grown more serious, and is wary of how his friends treat their many wives and girlfriends. But that doesn't keep Dean and Sal from preparing for another trip out West.
In a state of collective euphoria, Sal, Dean, Marylou, Ed Dunkel and his recovered wife start on another cross-country trip. In Louisiana, they stop by the country house of Bull Lee, an eccentric older writer who likes to experiment with drugs. They spend a day immersed in the weird life of Bull and his wife Jane, throwing knives and hopping on and off freight trains. Yet even the eccentric Bull Lee considers Dean to be a madman, advising Sal to stay away from him.
But Sal feels that he understands Dean better than anyone, almost as if they were alter egos of each other. Leaving Ed and his wife in New Orleans, the friends and Marylou head off again. They're completely broke, resorting to stealing gas and food to survive. For Sal, the mood on the road grows darker. Once they reach San Francisco, Dean immediately deserts them to see Camille. After another round of partying, the three part when Sal hops on the return bus to New York. They all feel slightly sick of each other.
In the spring of 1949, Sal returns to Denver. But all of his friends have left the city and his temporary job at a fruit market brings him no joy. After spending the night with a rich older woman, he's hustled up money to hit the road again.
Being on the move immediately makes Sal feel more at ease. The road has become a way of life to him. And so this time it's Sal who ends up knocking at Dean's house in San Francisco in the middle of the night, where he's back living with Camille. As usual, Dean answers the door in the nude. He tells Sal he's been working as a mechanic to take care of his wife and baby daughter. But he's been going crazy over Marylou, who's now married to a used-car dealer. As Dean is telling this, Camille is sobbing upstairs.
In the morning, the couple has a miserable fight, and Camille throws both Dean and Sal out of the house. Again, fate seems to have bound the two men together. But the dynamic of their friendship has shifted. Sal's reverence for Dean has given way to real affection. For the first time, Dean needs him, not the other way around.
The two make plans to find Dean's father and maybe make it to Italy or Greece. First though, they party for a couple nights in San Francisco. After hitting the jazz clubs, the friends catch a ride headed east.
In Denver, things go poorly. Dean is excited to meet a cousin, but the cousin only wants him to sign papers disowning the family. Afterwards, Dean goes on a car jacking spree. When he realizes one of the cars belonged to a detective, the pair decides to flee.
At a travel bureau, they meet a man who wants someone to drive his Cadillac to Chicago. They leave for New York with two boys going to religious school in the backseat. Within a few miles, Dean flips the car into a ditch. A farmer hauls them out. They are both enamored and terrified of the farmer's beautiful daughter, whom Dean describes as a "prairie angel." They make it to Chicago with seventeen hours of straight driving.
In Chicago, they drop off the battered Cadillac and run before anyone notices the damage. After a night watching movies on Skid Row in Detroit, they find a ride to New York, where they stay with Sal's aunt. The young men promise each other to be friends forever.
It's spring again. Sal has finally finished his novel and sold it to a publisher. What better use to put the money to than to go out West again?
This time, Dean is the one staying behind in New York. He's back working as a parking lot attendant to pay child support to Camille – who's had a second baby in the meantime – as well as provide for his new wife Inez and their child in New York. When Dean shows Sal pictures of his wife and kid, they almost appear like a regular All-American family.
The friends seem to be on different tracks once again. When they part, both feel lonely and misunderstood. In Denver, Sal gets some of the old gang back together. He feels happy and calm – he has no dreams anymore. But then Sal gets word that Dean has bought a car and is coming to join him. Sal knows what this means: Dean has gone crazy again.
Once arrived, Dean shares his plans to go to Mexico to get his divorce to Camille processed faster there. Sal and their friend Stan will join him. Their old dream of the West is replaced by the dream of the "magic South." And once they cross the border of Mexico, the country appears indeed exactly as magical as imagined – new and mysterious, but also welcoming and full of a lust for life.
The trio meet a man named Victor who gives them weed from his own garden and takes them to a brothel. They drink, smoke and dance all night. Sal briefly falls in love with an underage prostitute but is too shy to pursue her. The next morning, they continue on, passing the Sierra Madre mountains. They spend a dream-like night in the humidity of the jungle, encountering a wild horse and getting eaten up by bugs.
Finally, they end up in busy Mexico City, which presents itself much less magical than the rest of the country. Sal gets dysentery and is near unconscious for a few days. When he comes to, Dean informs him that he's gotten his divorce and will drive back to New York immediately. It feels like the end of their journey together – at least for now – but Sal can’t bring himself to be angry, sensing the tangled contradictions at the heart of Dean’s character.
A few weeks later, Sal is back in New York with a new girlfriend, Laura, and plans to move with her to San Francisco. When Dean suddenly shows up five weeks early to pick them up, he seems lost and incoherent, and Sal barely has time for him. He’s rushing to meet his friend Remi, who openly dislikes Dean, and leaves his old companion standing alone on a street corner. Still, Sal can’t stop thinking about the restless, reckless Dean Moriarty – a true man of the road.
This lesson to On the Road by Jack Kerouac followed the travels of young writer Sal Paradise.
In 1947 New York, Sal becomes captivated by the chaotic energy of ex-convict Dean Moriarty. Over several years, the friends embark on multiple cross-country journeys, chasing an elusive sense of freedom. They hitchhike, steal cars, juggle relationships with multiple women, and immerse themselves in jazz culture and drugs. Dean's manic intensity both attracts and exhausts Sal, who struggles between settled life and the road's pull. Their friendship peaks during a magical trip to Mexico, but ultimately frays as Dean's recklessness takes its toll. At the end of the road, Sal remains haunted by his friend's restless spirit.
On the Road (1957) is the defining novel of the Beat generation, written by one of its greatest minds. Based loosely on the lives and travels of the author himself, it follows young writer Sal Paradise and his reckless new friend Dean Moriarty on their wild journeys through America of the late 1940s. Their aimless wanderings lead the young rebels down winding paths of sex and drugs, love and despair – filled with surprising poetry.
Published in 1957, Jack Kerouac's autobiographical novel arrived like a manifesto for the Beat Generation – an infamous group of writers and artists rejecting conformity in favor of spontaneity, jazz, and restless spiritual wanderings.
Written in a three-week burst on a continuous scroll of paper, the novel's breathless, improvisational prose mirrors the frantic cross-country journeys it describes. It made Jack Kerouac an overnight sensation, scandalizing mainstream America while electrifying young readers hungry for alternatives to suburban domesticity.
In this lesson, you'll follow young writer Sal Paradise and his enigmatic friend Dean Moriarty in a story that became the blueprint for counterculture movements to come, inspiring everyone from hippies to punk rockers.
It's the winter of 1947 in New York City. Our narrator, a young writer named Sal Paradise, is just getting over a bad breakup. That's when he first encounters the enigmatic Dean Moriarty. A friend of a friend, Dean just got out of jail and supposedly wants to become a writer like himself. He's visiting the big city with his new wife Marylou, working as a parking lot attendant to make ends meet.
Sal first visits Dean in the couple's rundown apartment in Harlem. He encounters a frenetic young man full of ideas and desires. They spend a typical New York night out with their friends, drinking, smoking, listening to jazz music and talking until the early dawn.
One night shortly after, Dean shows up at Sal's door unannounced. He's had a big fight with Marylou and is now running from the police. Sal, intrigued by Dean, lets him live with him at his aunt's place. Over time, Sal grows enamored with Dean’s insatiable lust for life – so unlike the contrarian posturing of his intellectual friends. Before long, Dean becomes an emblematic figure for him: a true man of the road, and a veritable lunatic to match.
In spring, Dean decides that his first stint in New York is over. He wants to head back to his hometown Denver. Sal decides to save up some money and follow his new friend West. So in the summer of 1948, with 50 bucks in his pocket, Sal hits Route 6 to make it across the country. He takes a bus to Chicago, from where he begins to hitchhike, sustaining himself on apple pie and ice cream from cheap diners – which he swears keep getting better the further he ventures out West.
Sal hitches a ride from several road-worn truck drivers before catching "the greatest ride of his life" with two happy-go-lucky young farmers. Picking up every hitchhiker they come across on their way to Los Angeles, the back of the farmer's flatboard truck is crowded with fellow adventurers. Sal meets a sneaky-looking fella named "Montana Slim" and a kind hobo he calls "Mississippi Gene" with a silent young companion. The travelers on board spend the journey drinking, smoking and joking around. In the night, lying on the back of the truck and gazing at the stars up above, Sal is filled with a true sense of freedom and adventure. His journey West has begun.
In Denver, Sal boards up with another writer friend, Roland Major. But for the first few days, the elusive Dean is nowhere to be found. Finally, Sal receives a call from their mutual friend Carlo Marx. Carlo and Dean are both in Denver, but Dean has been busy juggling his new affair with a girl called Camille while simultaneously rekindling his relationship with Marylou. In between, the friends are experimenting with opiates and going to drag races.
Finally, Sal, Dean and Carlo reunite for a night about town. Dean even picks up a girl for Sal, but they end up staying out so late Roland Major won't let him back into the house. Their partying life continues for a while, Sal often finding himself in the role of passive observer to Dean's ravenous appetite for life and his endless ramblings.
Yet hints of sadness glint through the rambunctious facade of the friends' exploits. Sal can finally convince a girl to sleep with him, but she appears unimpressed. He's growing restless again. Having received some more money from his aunt, he decides to move on to San Francisco.
Just outside the big city, Sal moves in with his old friend Remi Boncoeur and his girlfriend Lee Ann. He gets a taste of the real world when Remi gets him a job as a nightguard at a barrack for construction workers. But tensions between the friends are slowly growing. Money is always tight, and Remi senses that Sal likes Lee Ann a little too much. To Sal, California appears increasingly empty and sad. When he shows up late and drunk to a dinner with Remi's stepfather, their friendship essentially implodes.
Craving movement, Sal decides to return East. On the bus to LA, he meets a pretty Mexican girl named Terry. They end up coupling up, but LA proves to be brutal. Sal only has twenty dollars left, and neither of them can find any work. So they travel to Terry's hometown in Sabinal, where he meets her brother, friends, and her seven-year-old son. The little make-shift family rent a tent near the cotton fields. For a while, Sal enjoys his new role as a husband, father and cotton picker. He finds a strange solace in the attitude of warm hopelessness embraced by Terry and her family. But eventually, the road calls him again. He spends his last money on a bus to Pittsburgh. Although Terry promises to visit him in NYC, they both know she won't make it.
Sal's journey back home is arduous – from Pittsburgh onwards, he has to hitchhike, relying on the kindness of strangers to buy him food. He arrives back in New York haggard and exhausted, where he learns that Dean has moved to San Francisco with his new girl Camille.
Over the next year, Sal finds his way back into regular life. He returns to school on the GI Bill and meets a girl named Lucille, whom he hopes to marry. But predictably, Dean pops back into Sal's life just as it seems stabilized. When Sal is celebrating Christmas 1948 with relatives in Virginia, Dean shows up at the doorstep, wired and unshaven. He has just left Camille and his new baby daughter in San Francisco. Marylou and Ed Dunkel are with him, a friend who also just ditched his wife.
Dean appears madder than ever. Before he knows it, he has dragged Sal back on the road. In New York, they reunite with old friends and party to Bop music all through New Year's weekend.
Sal's girlfriend Lucille immediately dislikes Dean, and Sal senses their relationship crumbling. He secretly likes Marylou, who's been flirting with him. But when Dean proposes that Sal make love to her in front of him, he finds himself too shy. Their old friend Carlo Marx has grown more serious, and is wary of how his friends treat their many wives and girlfriends. But that doesn't keep Dean and Sal from preparing for another trip out West.
In a state of collective euphoria, Sal, Dean, Marylou, Ed Dunkel and his recovered wife start on another cross-country trip. In Louisiana, they stop by the country house of Bull Lee, an eccentric older writer who likes to experiment with drugs. They spend a day immersed in the weird life of Bull and his wife Jane, throwing knives and hopping on and off freight trains. Yet even the eccentric Bull Lee considers Dean to be a madman, advising Sal to stay away from him.
But Sal feels that he understands Dean better than anyone, almost as if they were alter egos of each other. Leaving Ed and his wife in New Orleans, the friends and Marylou head off again. They're completely broke, resorting to stealing gas and food to survive. For Sal, the mood on the road grows darker. Once they reach San Francisco, Dean immediately deserts them to see Camille. After another round of partying, the three part when Sal hops on the return bus to New York. They all feel slightly sick of each other.
In the spring of 1949, Sal returns to Denver. But all of his friends have left the city and his temporary job at a fruit market brings him no joy. After spending the night with a rich older woman, he's hustled up money to hit the road again.
Being on the move immediately makes Sal feel more at ease. The road has become a way of life to him. And so this time it's Sal who ends up knocking at Dean's house in San Francisco in the middle of the night, where he's back living with Camille. As usual, Dean answers the door in the nude. He tells Sal he's been working as a mechanic to take care of his wife and baby daughter. But he's been going crazy over Marylou, who's now married to a used-car dealer. As Dean is telling this, Camille is sobbing upstairs.
In the morning, the couple has a miserable fight, and Camille throws both Dean and Sal out of the house. Again, fate seems to have bound the two men together. But the dynamic of their friendship has shifted. Sal's reverence for Dean has given way to real affection. For the first time, Dean needs him, not the other way around.
The two make plans to find Dean's father and maybe make it to Italy or Greece. First though, they party for a couple nights in San Francisco. After hitting the jazz clubs, the friends catch a ride headed east.
In Denver, things go poorly. Dean is excited to meet a cousin, but the cousin only wants him to sign papers disowning the family. Afterwards, Dean goes on a car jacking spree. When he realizes one of the cars belonged to a detective, the pair decides to flee.
At a travel bureau, they meet a man who wants someone to drive his Cadillac to Chicago. They leave for New York with two boys going to religious school in the backseat. Within a few miles, Dean flips the car into a ditch. A farmer hauls them out. They are both enamored and terrified of the farmer's beautiful daughter, whom Dean describes as a "prairie angel." They make it to Chicago with seventeen hours of straight driving.
In Chicago, they drop off the battered Cadillac and run before anyone notices the damage. After a night watching movies on Skid Row in Detroit, they find a ride to New York, where they stay with Sal's aunt. The young men promise each other to be friends forever.
It's spring again. Sal has finally finished his novel and sold it to a publisher. What better use to put the money to than to go out West again?
This time, Dean is the one staying behind in New York. He's back working as a parking lot attendant to pay child support to Camille – who's had a second baby in the meantime – as well as provide for his new wife Inez and their child in New York. When Dean shows Sal pictures of his wife and kid, they almost appear like a regular All-American family.
The friends seem to be on different tracks once again. When they part, both feel lonely and misunderstood. In Denver, Sal gets some of the old gang back together. He feels happy and calm – he has no dreams anymore. But then Sal gets word that Dean has bought a car and is coming to join him. Sal knows what this means: Dean has gone crazy again.
Once arrived, Dean shares his plans to go to Mexico to get his divorce to Camille processed faster there. Sal and their friend Stan will join him. Their old dream of the West is replaced by the dream of the "magic South." And once they cross the border of Mexico, the country appears indeed exactly as magical as imagined – new and mysterious, but also welcoming and full of a lust for life.
The trio meet a man named Victor who gives them weed from his own garden and takes them to a brothel. They drink, smoke and dance all night. Sal briefly falls in love with an underage prostitute but is too shy to pursue her. The next morning, they continue on, passing the Sierra Madre mountains. They spend a dream-like night in the humidity of the jungle, encountering a wild horse and getting eaten up by bugs.
Finally, they end up in busy Mexico City, which presents itself much less magical than the rest of the country. Sal gets dysentery and is near unconscious for a few days. When he comes to, Dean informs him that he's gotten his divorce and will drive back to New York immediately. It feels like the end of their journey together – at least for now – but Sal can’t bring himself to be angry, sensing the tangled contradictions at the heart of Dean’s character.
A few weeks later, Sal is back in New York with a new girlfriend, Laura, and plans to move with her to San Francisco. When Dean suddenly shows up five weeks early to pick them up, he seems lost and incoherent, and Sal barely has time for him. He’s rushing to meet his friend Remi, who openly dislikes Dean, and leaves his old companion standing alone on a street corner. Still, Sal can’t stop thinking about the restless, reckless Dean Moriarty – a true man of the road.
This lesson to On the Road by Jack Kerouac followed the travels of young writer Sal Paradise.
In 1947 New York, Sal becomes captivated by the chaotic energy of ex-convict Dean Moriarty. Over several years, the friends embark on multiple cross-country journeys, chasing an elusive sense of freedom. They hitchhike, steal cars, juggle relationships with multiple women, and immerse themselves in jazz culture and drugs. Dean's manic intensity both attracts and exhausts Sal, who struggles between settled life and the road's pull. Their friendship peaks during a magical trip to Mexico, but ultimately frays as Dean's recklessness takes its toll. At the end of the road, Sal remains haunted by his friend's restless spirit.
Comments
Post a Comment