On the Road Review

In my friend’s room, some years ago, there was a poster of Jack Kerouac (left), looking pensively into the lens. One night, somewhat inebriated, I read the quote underneath. Anyone who has ever read On the Road, or anyone who has read an interpretation or a review of On the Road, will know this quote.

“The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars.” 

That same intoxicated night, as I stumbled out of his dishevelled university housing and somehow made my way home, the same quote resonated in my mind. The next morning, waking up in that preliminary stage of a hangover, where one feels partially drunk and partially repugnant, where one considers the fragmented sequence of events from the night before, I remembered the poster on the wall, and the beauty of that quote.

Now, in an effort to avoid sentimentalizing On the Road, it’s important to note that I finished my current novel, Buchan’s 39 Steps, and then purchased On the Road from Amazon. A tale somewhat devoid of romance and certainly antithetical to the lifestyle that Kerouac’s ‘Beat Bible’ expounds.

I was 18 when I read it, as everyone seemed to be, and unfortunately, to accord to the commonplace, I was astonished by it. I am far older, far wiser and certainly more indebted to the world of literature now, so my second reading may not be as commonplace.

Firstly, let me make this very clear from the outset, I loved and still love this book. However, without the rose tinted beat glasses and the thirst for adventure, exploration and personal discovery, I am happy to concede that this book has its faults.

The vocabulary is far from extensive, the prose is often overly romantic and the story is at times fragmented.  Commentators often attribute, and arguably excuse, these faults to the legend that surrounds this novel: the three week burst in which it was written, the haze of drugs that apparently played a role in such an expeditious accomplishment and perhaps most notoriously, the monolithic 100+ foot scroll on which it was produced (right).

Nonetheless, this legend, for solely literary reasons, must be ignored. One of the problems with the novel, as mentioned earlier, is that it is often sensationalized. It is viewed as a sort of nostalgic, adolescent treasure that played an all encompassing role in its reader’s formative years. And much like Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye, its legend often proceeds it’s literary achievement.

The book, in a purely non-romantic, literary sense, is still extremely readable. What I found most enjoyable on the second read is how it opens up and challenges the conventions of literature. By employing his ‘spontaneous prose’, Kerouac opens the story up, and while this inexorably fragments it, the result is a fast, dynamic tale of camaraderie,  love and adventure. The autobiographical essence of the book evokes feelings of verisimilitude and brutality to the novel. It awards it with a sense of honesty.

The novel follows protagonist Sal Paradise, Kerouac’s alter-ego, on various cross country trips through America, and down to Mexico, joined for the large part by his mercurial friend Dean Moriarty, based on Neal Cassady. Dean is the heart of the story; his wild, unpredictable endeavours, his lust for life and his regression from mad hero to pitiful fool provide the novel with its finest moments.

Dean embodies the spirit of the Beat Generation, a post-war American subculture headed by the likes of Kerouac, William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg. His perpetual quest to find jazz, sex, drugs and love, that are immortalized in these pages, exemplifies the ethos of all those who are considered ‘Beat’.

As the story progresses, the trips seem less and less rewarding. The novel ends with Sal and his new girl planning on moving to San Francisco, and Dean appearing to help with the move. Everything falls through however, and Dean disappears for a final time, leaving Sal to reminisce about their adventures, seeming strangely bereft. The novel ends as nostalgically as it began, with Sal dreaming of Dean Moriarty.

The second read is interesting; you are still rewarded with the sense of adventure and the fast, incomparable prose. What is taken away is the life-affirming feeling that teenagers receive, and it's replaced by a feeling of emptiness, perhaps a disappointment that you can’t heed the same results. 

On the Road is still a good novel, and I would recommend it to anyone who hasn't read it, however once I tore myself away from the glare of sentiment and the overbearing shadow of nostalgia, I saw some of its faults and came to the realization that while it is still emphatically interesting and entertaining, I can no longer consider it the finest piece of American literature.