Jack Kerouac

[mahler10th]

Jack Kerouacs original 'On the Road' scroll is on display for a while at the British Library in London.  I am a great fan of Jack Kerouac, having amassed and read many times over his books.  My favourite book was not 'On the Road', it was 'Desolation Angels'.  I don't know how long Kerouacs manuscript is going to be there for, but I'll do cartwheels to get to London to see the damn thing as soon as I can.
Maybe I should listen to more Jazz.   

[Karl Henning]

Jack Kerouacs original 'On the Road' scroll is on display for a while at the British Library in London.

Nice! I have the paperback edition of the original scroll (I've not read it yet). I did enjoy reading On the Road back in my Wooster days.  Not sure how I shall like Kerouac, returning to him now.  I don't think I've read Desolation Angels.

[Rinaldo]

Kerouac's free flowing prose is something I've always aspired to achieve in my own writing but I wouldn't count myself as much of a fan.. I haven't even finished On the Road. But I love parts of Dharma Bums and Big Sur. Some of the lines in those are pure magic and the "you can't fall off a mountain" passage from Bums actually helped me keep my spirits up when I got lost in the Alps once.

[Geo Dude]

I wouldn't call myself a big fan of Kerouac, though I would love to see that exhibit.  I love On The Road and like Dharma Bums, but I find that I hate his work after that.  At least, I hated Big Sur, which I really expected to love.

[mahler10th]

Nice! I have the paperback edition of the original scroll (I've not read it yet). I did enjoy reading On the Road back in my Wooster days.  Not sure how I shall like Kerouac, returning to him now.  I don't think I've read Desolation Angels.

Does it open with "...I met met Dean Moriarty..."  Two 'mets' as in the first line of the original 36 meter long typescript!
I liked Dharma Bums too...I agree that if I returned to his books today, my feelings may be different, but as a late teenager and in my early twenties, Jack Kerouac was most definitely my literary hero.  Unfortunately, he was not well known in Scotland at that time.  I did my best to disseminate him around, but it didn't work out very well...
Of all his books, Visions of Cody is most interesting, and most weird.  When I first read it in 1984, I was most impressed by the reel to reel tape transcriptions in it.  Clearly, Visions of Cody was a book written with the aid of drugs, but its experimental style and unusually creative content gripped me.

I wouldn't call myself a big fan of Kerouac, though I would love to see that exhibit.  I love On The Road and like Dharma Bums, but I find that I hate his work after that.  At least, I hated Big Sur, which I really expected to love.

Yes, for some reason Big Sur was also my biggest disappointment, but it didn't matter for me at that time, it was Jack Kerouac.  God knows what I would think reading it now.   

[Geo Dude]

Yes, for some reason Big Sur was also my biggest disappointment, but it didn't matter for me at that time, it was Jack Kerouac.  God knows what I would think reading it now.   

I was reading  a collection of Hunter S. Thompson's letters and in one of them he was asked about Kerouac's novels--he had previously written to that person that he thought On The Road was a great novel - no surprise there!--he replied that he was reading "a stupid, stupid f**king novel called Big Sur that makes me wish there was a herd of beatniks behind my house that I could shoot at." (consider that a paraphrase, I don't remember the exact quote down to the letter.)

That said, I love On The Road not just for the adventure, but for Kerouac's characterizations.  He tends to find the most kind-hearted (and overly idealistic) way to express his thoughts on each person he meets or spends time with.  Granted, I think that tendency to look on peoples' good side and not see the bad is what lead him to ruin, but it still reveals a very sweet man hiding behind the legend.

[CriticalI]

I assume the exhibit's related to the upcoming film?

I read On The Road years ago; my main impression was that the two main characters were a pair of aholes. Give me Burroughs any day

[drogulus]

I assume the exhibit's related to the upcoming film?

I read On The Road years ago; my main impression was that the two main characters were a pair of aholes. Give me Burroughs any day

     There may be a kind of unspoken critical agreement to mark down the beat writers as a group because as human beings they tended to be monumental shitheads. One might apply that to Kerouac, Ginsberg, Cassidy and Burroughs. Burroughs had the virtue of some intelligence and humor, though poor marksmanship let him down at a critical point.

[mahler10th]

I assume the exhibit's related to the upcoming film?
I read On The Road years ago; my main impression was that the two main characters were a pair of aholes. Give me Burroughs any day

Probably is related to the film.  I will not go see the film, I've seen trailers and already it looks shit.

...though poor marksmanship let him down at a critical point.

A film about that incident and its strangeness would have been a better idea!

[CriticalI]

A film about that incident and its strangeness would have been a better idea!

I've had an idea for a while for a film called Bill & Joan in Mexico, which would be about just that (possibly Ed Norton could star?). As I am not a screenwriter, you're welcome to do the deed yourself.

[drogulus]

I've had an idea for a while for a film called Bill & Joan in Mexico, which would be about just that (possibly Ed Norton could star?). As I am not a screenwriter, you're welcome to do the deed yourself.

     Daniel Day Lewis might fit the "Bill", eh?

[DavidRoss]

My favourite book was not 'On the Road', it was 'Desolation Angels'. 

That was my favorite among his books, too. Changed my life--though maybe the change had already begun with my first exposure to him through On the Road. I was in my late teens, naïve and impressionable (even though rather worldly in comparison to my friends), the '60s were ending, the world was changing, and I subsequently dropped out of school and became a vagabond. Romantic? Yes. But wise? No.

Maybe I should listen to more Jazz.   

How much jazz do you listen to?

[Karl Henning]

As a generation, they were romantic ere they were wise ....

[mahler10th]

How much jazz do you listen to?

None David.  I took a shine to Thelonious Monk a while back, his kind of jazz is the only kind I can 'dig', and I do have two albums by him.  But I don't listen to Jazz at all, haven't listened to Monk for some time.  Jazz doesn't seem to 'fit' me at all, I've never liked it that much probably because I am ignorant of its value and nature.  I tend to switch it off.     Still, maybe I will get that Monk out again because his Jazz really did open my eyes...but only a wee bit. 

I've had an idea for a while for a film called Bill & Joan in Mexico, which would be about just that (possibly Ed Norton could star?). As I am not a screenwriter, you're welcome to do the deed yourself.

Interesting.  I will address this in the GMG writers thread.

[Rinaldo]

A film about that incident and its strangeness would have been a better idea!

Been there, done that.

[mahler10th]

Been there, done that.

Oh good, someone's already done it.  I'll probably never watch that either.  Kiefer Sutherland as Burroughs?  Not sure about that casting.  Produced and written by the same person, Gary Walkow, a very creative guy but not my cup of tea.

[DavidRoss]

As a generation, they were romantic ere they were wise ....

Not that the lessons learned--nay, survived--were without value. Some certainly contributed to my own modest store of wisdom, hard won and slow learned. At times I identify strongly with Rutger Hauer's dying speech in Blade Runner.

[Karl Henning]

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe