If you’ve not seen yet finally a film version of Kerouac’s on the road is finally being made after more than 20 years of false starts it reaches our screens in the summer .I first heard of Kerouac as a fourteen year old when my friend Andy loaned me some Doors music, but also Jerry Hopkins AND Danny Sugerman’s wonderful biography of the Doors lead singer Jim Morrison “no one here gets out alive “.early on in the book Jim’s describes his reaction to reading “on the road “and how it led to him following the rest of the Beat group of writers figure such as William Burroughs ,.Allen Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghetti .So me as bookish young teen and in some ways looking for something to mean something to me , made my first move it to the world of the beats he’d read and got a copy of Burroughs’ naked lunch I know not the best first choice but I lapped it up in a couple of days and then moved on to On the road and lived in Jack’s footsteps and his friends as I found out the book is as much about Kerouac’s real life at the time .At this time I had a very tense home life I don’t get on well with my stepfather and there was a constant sense of unease at my home.So these books gave me great escape but also as Jim and Jack had both hitch-hike I start missing college and hitch-hiking round firstly in Cheshire and Manchester as I spent my days escaping the impending doom of coming home at night to an unsettled feeling at home I found beauty in the world whether it seeing the world moving or a bird or plant as I waited for a ride .I became a more open person due to this as Hitch-hiking forces you to talk to the person who has picked you up .Well this carried on even after I left and moved to Northumberland to live with my father. I read more and more Burroughs and Kerouac thanks in two ways to the newly opened Barter books in Alnwick where I lived and the wonderful stock Alnwick library which even thou a small Library had a number of William Burroughs books so cities of red night ,nova express and others fell through my hands as I tried to live as a beat in a small way ,drinking, seeing the world , writing poetry (bad poetry looking back but loved typing on an old typewriter I’d been given ) and maybe in some way trying to escape impending adulthood in a way , this I did till well in my twenties and managed to reached Germany as I still had wanderlust and now a romance , had a ball with my German girlfriend seeing different places and cultures first hand was something I’ll never regret .I know look back and have fond memories of what one small book has brought to my life and also a tinge of sadness as it must be over ten years since I read a beat writer but with a new collection of william Burroughs letters out by Penguin this month I feel a summer dive into some beat writing is called for ,I m sure I said that two summers ago but this summer I m going get on the road again anyway in my mind as I know have a wonderful home life with my dear Amanda and Winston ,so the need to run has gone some what .I ll leave you with the trailer for on the road .
I am ashamed I have not read On the Road. All good for the film, though.
Wow, I’ve got to see this. Loved the book. Beautiful post.
thanks mark I m looking forward to it as well ,all the best stu
Loved the book & like yourself went through a period where hitching was my pony, traveled a fair amount of this country & close continent in that fashion, reading the beasts. Al;though I loved Kerouac my favourite was Ferlinghetti, who I first got into via this poem – Don’t Let That Horse …
Don’t let that horse
eat that violin
cried Chagall’s mother
But he
kept right on
painting
And became famous
And kept on painting
The Horse With Violin In Mouth
And when he finally finished it
he jumped up upon the horse
and rode away
waving the violin
And then with a low bow gave it
to the first naked nude he ran across
And there were no strings
attached
Wonderful poem!
wonderful choice Gary I do wonder if it is a very male think the beats at time ,all the best stu
We spoke about this on Twitter last week. Nice to see you turn your memories into a post.
Rob
We spoke about this on Twitter last week. Nice to see you turning your memories into a post.
Rob
Yes seemed like a nice post to do Rob as I read bit no one after we’d spoken ,all the best stu
I read the Beats when I was teen, but I was never inspired to be as adventurous as you were! I will definitely see if I can watch the film – love the time period and the characters. It should be good!
I was a unruly youngster maybe the wandering helped me calm down a little bit ,all the best stu
I read On the Road as a student, and at the time I enjoyed it, but it never set me on fire, and I have no need to re-read it. I never got very far with Burroughs, disliking the Naked Lunch big-time – but at least I tried.
However, I very much enjoyed the Sugarman book on Jim Morrison. I listened to the Doors a lot in my 20s and 30s.
I liked burroughs other books more than this one which I only choose first as it was first I saw in a shop as it was pre internet days so could only get what was at hand ,all the best stu
What a great story, Stu. I read Ginsberg’s ‘Howl’ at uni and it just blew me away, so of course I had to go on a Ginsberg tear and read everything I could about him and the Beats. Man, those guys were originals. It was kind of sad how most of them ended up, but a body can only take so much booze and drugs before it breaks. Have you read ‘When I Was Cool’ by Sam Kashner? It’s a brilliant coming-of-age brilliant memoir about how he became the first student at the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, set up by Ginsberg in honour of Kerouac. It’s such a great book and we get to see Burroughs and Ginsberg and Corso in all their weirdness, but the story is told with such love and honour. It’s well worth reading if you haven’t already.
I ve not read the Kashner and it sounds like a book I d love will check my library after the iffp reading is cleared up I loved howl ,rage against machine set some of his poems to music which brought them bang up to date ,all the best stu
I have the book but have not yet read it.
Look forward to your review when you do Nana ,all the best stu
I loved the Beats as a teenager (though I never read Ferlinghetti). I also had a tense home life, and their writing seemed so immediate and so full of something other than the drabness of the council estate I grew up on.
For escape I had SF, somehow this seemed more rooted in the world, but a vision of it that was real but beyond that on offer. Escape into the world, rather than from it.
Nice post Stu.
I did escape into some fantasy books at that time magican, lord rings and the king dark tower series .I not read many sci fi a couple of moorcock’s as he was meant to be one that was highloy respected ,all the best stu
Great post Stu! I haven’t actually read anything Beat yet… Oh I feel so ashamed to write it. Will have to do it. Very soon. Thanks for reminding me of what I am missing out on 🙂
Hope you do try them at some point ,all the best stu
I wish I had an inspirational book story… Wonderful post, Stu.
Plus a nudge to me to investigate those authors. I haven’t read Kerouac or Burroughs.
sure you have somewhere Sarah ,all the best stu