Rating:★☆☆☆☆
Paperback: 310 pages
Pub. Date: December 1976
Tags: fiction, classics, beat generation
Synopsis: On the Road chronicles Jack Kerouac's years traveling the North American continent with his friend Neal Cassady, "a sideburned hero of the snowy West." As "Sal Paradise" and "Dean Moriarty," the two roam the country in a quest for self-knowledge and experience. Kerouac's love of America, his compassion for humanity, and his sense of language as jazz combine to make On the Road an inspirational work of lasting importance.
Kerouac's classic novel of freedom and longing defined what it meant to be "Beat" and has inspired every generation since its initial publication more than forty years ago. - B&N
January 5, 2008
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"I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one falling star to another till I drop. This is the night, what it does to you. I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion."
- Part Two, Ch. 4
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Review: Well ya know what Sal? Imagine my own confusion as to why so many people consider this book a classic. Although I'm one to stray from the traditional, this novel is basically a formless mess. I wouldn't mind an unrestrained writing style if the story was interesting enough to tell, but this one was hardly worth my time. On the Road makes for a difficult read...well, torturous really, with all of the incessant rambling and all. Not too mention, it is both incredibly boring, monotonous, and uninspiring.
Remember that terrible movie Groundhog Day where Bill Murray had to live the same day over and over again? That is what this book is like. The entire book is repetetive, even the same phrases were repeated from beginning to end. I swear, if I had to read one more line of Dean Moriarty saying, (whispering, exclaiming, thinking, or whatever-ing), "Yes, Yes, Yes." I'll freakin' lose it. Especially, if the Yes's change to the even more absurd "Yass" (...) God, don't even get me started on that mess. So yeah, I struggled to finish this book (and fought even harder not to trash it after the first few pages). The only reason I did read the entire thing is because I have this annoying need to finish each book I start.
However, among the madness, there is some beauty to be found. Unfortunately these moments of lyricism are not enough to carry you through the book, which is a shame because lines like these I absolutely loved:
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"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 common place thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars."
- Part One, Ch. 1
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It is this exact quote that made me want to read this book in the first place. I am disappointed that this book didn't live up to my expectations. It is clearly overrated and impossible to appreciate.
I think Truman Capote said it best about Kerouac's work, "That's not writing, it's typing."
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