pickMy new favorite Jack Kerouac book. As you follow the story of Ray and his friends you feel like you are right there experiencing everything too.
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pickMy new favorite Jack Kerouac book. As you follow the story of Ray and his friends you feel like you are right there experiencing everything too.
Bought this a while back and am finally getting into it.
#rebranding And some of us thought rebranding was a new thing.It seemed like Allen Ginsburg went effortlessly from beat to Hippie, with the turning of the pages on the calendar.Kerouac disavowed the idea of the Beats leading to the Hippies,and/or he being the “father” of both.Signet didn‘t seem to have any trouble turning Jacks books into Hippie inspiration.Found today at the book sale.
AND DON‘T CALL IT FRISCO!
pickThe tagged book was between a pick and a so-so for me, because I initially felt like a lot of these poems lacked depth. But after reading the other 2 books I learned that haiku, by style, aren't usually complete statements, but are curated with the hope in mind that the readers adds to it with their own meanings. This made me appreciate Kerouac's haiku even more, so it's a pick. These were my most recent reads so I'm finally caught up on my posts!
I was in Big Sur about this time last year and saved this for a nostalgia read in hopes of a love letter to a place I love. And how disappointed was I. This book is barely an ode to such a stunning landscape and part of the world. It is about a drunk sad lonely man unsure and unhappy with fame. Racism and misogyny abound through its pages and the lyrical lines and descriptions do not outweigh the worse parts of the book.
But this is all speculation, mediation, nay, emasculation...I find in you a kindred absorption with identity, dramatic meaning, classic unity, and immortality: you pace a stage, yet sit in the boxes and watch. You seek identity in the midst of indistinguishable chaos, in sprawling nameless reality. Like myself, you deserve the Adlerian verdict...He who seeks all knowledge, and then all life and all power...He is egocentric. How paltry is the def.
“Write in recollection and amazement for yourself
Work from pithy middle eye out, swimming in language sea
Accept loss forever
Believe in the holy contour of life“
Remembering Jack Kerouac on his birthday.
Happy 100th Birthday, Jack Kerouac! Kerouac receives a lot of slack now for being a dudebro writer & while some of the criticism is fair, it would be incredibly disingenuous of me to not acknowledge the role that he played in my reading life. Reading on the Road when I was 18 was a rite of passage & there are certain exuberant passages that I still vividly recall. More than OTR, I was intrigued & haunted by the mysterious figure of Dr. Sax.👇
Hey, Jack Kerouac, I think it‘s your birthday. One hundredth, to be exact. Photo by Allen Ginsberg.
“I wish the whole world was dead serious about food instead of silly rockets and machines and explosives using everybody's food money to blow their heads off.”
—The Dharma Bums (1958)
