On The Road

It took me a month to finish reading On The Road by Jack Kerouac. It started out just fine. I was eager to read it; I'd heard it was the definitive book of the beat generation or some such nonsense. I got a good laugh out of Allen Ginsberg being renamed Carlo Marx in this book. I also enjoyed reading about more "innocent" times. I put the word in quotes because although the character Sal Paradise (who is supposed to be Kerouac's fictional name) is able to hitch hike across the country and pick up strangers along the way, stay in the homes of virtual strangers, and just go off somewhere with someone he's just met and not fear for his life, he still smokes pot and takes other drugs. I especially enjoyed the first part of the book when Sal was travelling by himself.

Sal meets Dean Moriarty (the fictional name of one of Kerouac's friends), a wildly enthusiastic but extremely selfish self centered man who is impulsive, drives wildly and goes back and forth between 2 or 3 women. The first adventure the two of them have was amusing but then I began to tire of Dean and every time he'd reappear, I'd groan.

People thought Moriarty was based on Jack Kerouac and kept expecting him to act like a wild and crazy guy. That must have been a real pain.

Bottom line for me: this book was about a man who goes back and forth across the country several times, impulsively, has a few amusing adventures and that's it. I guess it's just not my generation.