This book is solidly cemented as an absolute classic. It essentially inspired a whole Beatnik generation, of which Kerouac claims naming rights. It has countless accolades and appears on literature lists like Time's 100 best English-language novels 1923-2005. Legend has it that Kerouac wrote it as a single paragraph on eight sheets of paper taped together to make a 120 foot scroll. This I can believe because the book feels exactly like a really long stream of consciousness blurted onto the page:
And for just a moment I had reached the point of ecstasy that I always wanted to reach, which was the complete step across chronological time into timeless shadows, and wonderment in the bleakness of the mortal realm, and the sensation of death kicking at my heels to move on, with a phantom dogging its own heels, and myself hurrying to a plank where all the angels dove off and flew into the holy void of uncreated emptiness...
*yawn*. This book was lots of rushing from New York to Denver to LA to San Fran to New York to Denver to San Fran to New York, without any time to really develop characters or get a deep appreciation for anywhere. For all the talk of 'digging', I don't think Sal or Dean ever really 'dug' anything properly, they were always too frantic to get somewhere else. Although some interesting adventures are had, the book is full of a lot of incidental boring stories about the mechanics of travel; hitched a ride to here, caught a bus to there etc.
For its time I imagine the modes of travel, and the free-spirit thinking, were revolutionary so I should cut it some slack. An interesting journey, but not life-changing.
2 stars.
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