Follow your wanderlust through Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. This iconic novel of the Beat Generation takes us to 1950s America. It’s a dizzying trip filled with jazz, poetry, friendship, betrayal, and the open road. We revel in the book’s relentless momentum and scintillating language. But we also critique the troubling ways that it handles race and gender, and idealizes self-absorption.
Two expert guests expand our view of the book. Jerry Cimino, Founder and Director of the Beat Museum in San Francisco, makes Kerouac’s post-war context come alive. He also describes the impact that On the Road had on counterculture movements like the hippies in the 1960s, and its enduring appeal for readers today. We also interview Dr. Jean-Christophe Cloutier, who is Associate Professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania. He tells us about Kerouac’s often-overlooked French Canadian background. That in turn challenges us to view this quintessentially American novel in a broader international context.
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Sources
Bloom, Harold. “Introduction.” Bloom’s Modern Critical Interpretations: Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, Chelsea House Publishers, 2004, pp. 1-2.
Gottlieb Vopat, Carole. “Jack Kerouac’s On the Road: A Re-evaluation.” Bloom’s Modern Critical Interpretations: Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, Chelsea House Publishers, 2004, pp. 3-18.
Kerouac, Jack. On the Road. Narrated by David Carradine, Penguin Random House Audio, 2008. Audiobook, https://www.penguinrandomhouseaudio.com/book/540750/on-the-road/.
Morrison, Toni. Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination. Vintage, 1993.