“An awful realization that I have been fooling myself all my life thinking there was a next thing to do to keep the show going and actually I'm just a sick clown and so is everybody else..." -Jack Kerouac, Big Sur. An actual mugshot felt like the right way to open this collection. This mug may be from a naval enlistment, not central booking, but it’ll do the job.
Kerouac has been in and out of my “To read” list the last year. Sams dad really likes him so when he visited CO we went around and saw all the places he lived loved and lost ( mostly his mind ). From the Colfax apartment where “experimented” to the steam boat spring Mural and Silver-town opera.
For sure add Big Sur to that list if it's not on there. It's probably my favorite, leaving aside On the Road, which is its own gleaming island onto itself. It's also the heartbreaking counterpoint to Road, the dead end of all that fame, which he never wanted and couldn't handle
I read him as a teenager and felt inspired. Probably wouldn’t be a writer today without On the Road even though everyone shits on it and the whole beat movement now. I read his poetry recently, but I think his prose was more fulfilling.
Well said. I've only read the opening pages of Desolation Angels, but I have heard it's in the bleaker vein of Big Sur (same way I'm told Dharma Bums, which I also haven't read, overlaps with On the Road). In Cold Blood is a great work of journalism, I remember, but as for its author, fair enough, that's another question...
Ah, I now see that Desolation Angels, though published in '62 was written in the 50s. I knew he was on the Desolation Peak lookout earlier but I thought he wrote the book toward the end of his life. That makes sense then that it wouldn't be bleak in the way Big Sur was. Thanks for the clarifier
He was embedded in my consciousness by expat teachers in a school thousands of miles from where I’m sitting now.
Capote, a great writer, but jealous as hell, was wrong about him.
Ha, yes, he was wrong, but it's a great quote!
It’s him at his bitchy best
And what I like the most about him.
Great first edition.
Kerouac has been in and out of my “To read” list the last year. Sams dad really likes him so when he visited CO we went around and saw all the places he lived loved and lost ( mostly his mind ). From the Colfax apartment where “experimented” to the steam boat spring Mural and Silver-town opera.
For sure add Big Sur to that list if it's not on there. It's probably my favorite, leaving aside On the Road, which is its own gleaming island onto itself. It's also the heartbreaking counterpoint to Road, the dead end of all that fame, which he never wanted and couldn't handle
Great mugshot! Greater piece if writing on Kerouac. Thx
Thank you! He did actually have a brief jail stint once but I don't know whether there was a mugshot taken
I read him as a teenager and felt inspired. Probably wouldn’t be a writer today without On the Road even though everyone shits on it and the whole beat movement now. I read his poetry recently, but I think his prose was more fulfilling.
Ha, yes, but people will always take shits everywhere. It's a shame they don't stick to their own backyard, which they know better
Yeah, makes sense, maybe people just don’t have backyards and that’s why they’re always shitting all over the place. I think we solved it!
Once I finish On the road I will definitely read Big Sur.
Well said. I've only read the opening pages of Desolation Angels, but I have heard it's in the bleaker vein of Big Sur (same way I'm told Dharma Bums, which I also haven't read, overlaps with On the Road). In Cold Blood is a great work of journalism, I remember, but as for its author, fair enough, that's another question...
Ah, I now see that Desolation Angels, though published in '62 was written in the 50s. I knew he was on the Desolation Peak lookout earlier but I thought he wrote the book toward the end of his life. That makes sense then that it wouldn't be bleak in the way Big Sur was. Thanks for the clarifier