On the Road by Jack Kerouac: Critical Essay

Introduction

"I had just gotten over a serious illness that I won't bother to talk about, except that it had something to do with the miserably weary split-up and my feeling that everything was dead. With the coming of Dean Moriarty began the part of my life you could call my life on the road (Kerouac, 1999 pg1). Before that, I'd often dreamed of going West to see the country, always vaguely planning and never taking off."

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One of the best excerpts from your book which happens to be the very first paragraph of your book. I always try to imagine what you could have been going through in life for you to compose such deep feelings. From my wild thoughts which you will forgive me for, I see you sitting somewhere lonely maybe in your house or a bar and just wondering what went wrong with your life. Or what did you do so faulty in life that you deserve to endure such pain in life? The reason for my comments is because I had reached such a point in life back in fifth grade when I was sick after having a food poisoning. Leave alone diarrhea but also the fact that I could not eat anything and It was on a Christmas. I felt so pissed off by everyone around me because at the time I felt like they were the reason why am going through this. Although this may sound funny, I had some bad times given my age at that time. Many are the times when one reaches such a point where you always try to move on from something maybe be, a breakup. Before I read your book I used to date a girl, and after some time we broke up, I won't go into details of the breakup but I tried to move on but I could not. Like you perfectly describe it I started living my life on the road where I kept on planning to take off and walk out of this relationship. But when I read your book, it gave me some confidence to move on with my life, which I did.

"If you drop a rose in the Hudson River at its mysterious source in the Adirondacks, think of all the places it journeys by as it goes out to sea forever - think of that wonderful Hudson Valley. I started hitching up the thing. Five scattered rides took me to the desired Bear Mountain Fridge, I had no shelter. I had to run under some pines to take cover; this did no good; I began crying and swearing and socking myself on the head for being such a damn fool. I was forty miles north of New York; all the way up I'd been worried about the fact that on this, my big opening day, I was only moving north instead of the so-longed-for west (Kerouac 1999 pg. 9). I ran a quarter-mile to an abandoned cute English-style filling station and stood under the dripping leaves. All I could see were smoky trees and desolate wilderness rising to the skies. What the hell am I doing up here?"

The favorite part of your book "The Road." I like how you start by wondering the distance 'a rose 'travel's if it falls from the source in the Hudson River until it reaches its source forever in the sea. I compare this piece of writing with the things I encounter in my life. I have to go through tough times to reach my goals in life. So long as the 'rose' keeps on flowing despite the distance, dangerous water currents, breathtaking waterfalls, perilous water animals it is still able to reach the sea. Despite the challenges that I face in my life which at times can make someone lose hope of ever achieving his or her goals in life this piece of writing encourages me not to lose faith but instead adapt to the circumstances for me to be able to survive in life.

This piece of writing also teaches me to stay focused on where am headed to in life. It reminds me that focus is everything I need to make it in life. Despite the rain and being alone in the mountains you still managed to take refuge in a nearby abandoned filling station. Despite being very far away from the neighboring city of New York, you always longed to get to the west where you had agreed to meet your friend and take a trip-round the world. This encourages me that I should be focused on my ultimate goal in life and no barriers should hinder me from achieving the goals.

I like humor, and this excerpt brings out this aspect perfectly well. When you began to cry and swear that you are a fool for being that far away from your direction of focus. The excerpt reminds me of a moment in life when I failed to carry an umbrella deliberately, and it's on a rainy season. And when rained on and soaking wet I would turn back to my inner self and wonder how foolish I was not to carry an umbrella and save myself from being rained on. I have read this part like a hundred times when am bored. Another piece that brings humor in this section is when you ask what the hell you were doing so far away from your focus. At first, when I read this book for the first time, I have to confess to you, I did not understand the joke, but after reading the book and precisely the story for the second time, I got the joke perfectly well. Just wondering what the hell you are doing so far away from home to be rained on and you could only have stayed at home and evade all this disastrous trip. It reminds me of the many times that I do some crazy stuff then when things go South I start asking myself am like, Why the hell did I do this thing?!

"I once made a spot remover that has since been copied by big firms in the East. I've been trying to collect on that for some years now. If I only had enough money to raise a decent lawyer (Kerouac, 1999). But it was too late to raise a decent lawyer, and he sat in his house dejectedly."

These are compelling words in life which explains the condition of much low class or poor people in the world who might have many inventions, but because they don't have enough resources to get that idea to the world, many prominent persons or institutions tend to take advantage of them and manipulate them. Justice is also hard to find when you can't hire a good lawyer. I love this excerpt because it perfectly reflects the image in our current society whereby the poor are continuously being humiliated in the presence of the rich, and they are not able to get justice because they can't get themselves a good judge.

"And in Iowa, I know by now the children must be crying in the land where they let the children cry, and tonight the stars'll be out, and don't you know that God is Pooh Bearth (Kerouac pg.178). Evening star must be drooping and shedding her sparkler dims on the prairie, which is just before the coming of complete night that blesses the earth, darkens all rivers, cups the peaks and folds the final shore in, and nobody, nobody knows what's going to happen to anybody besides the forlorn rags of growing old," ?

I love the way you always end your pieces of writing with this not being an exception. You always leave us with a piece of wise saying which still leaves us contemplating about its meaning. This phrase means that we should not always take life so serious that one must live with strict guidelines all his precious life, but instead, we should keep it as simple as possible simple and put God first as he oversees over everything. And in the end, we should remain simple in our lives and love each other.

Conclusion

From the book "On the Road" there are several lessons which can be learned and applied in our day to day lives. In the book, we learn about a relationship between two friends Sal and Dean where Sal helps Dean to become a very famous person in the West but Dean, but Dean does not show equal concern and care, instead he leaves his friend who helped him to build himself and instead leaves him to starve in the San Francisco. Deans perfidy is again seen when he abandons Sal once more in Mexico. We can relate this to the modern society where we experience friends trancing each other in the contemporary society. Betrayal between friends is abundant in the contemporary culture. From this book, we can borrow this important lesson in life and be cautious when we are choosing our friends.

Another important aspect which is highly elaborate in the book is the involvement of the young people on drugs, sex, and madness. We learn that Sal adore's the madness in other people he meets, but he's not able to replicate that to himself unless when he's under the influence of drugs or alcohol which have nearly caused him to die due to starvation. There is a profound connection between what Sal is going through with the modern people especially the young generation. Most of them envy the lifestyle, or I call it the madness of others especially friends or celebrities but they can't appreciate the way they are and always try to fall into drugs. Under the influence of drugs, they can do all sorts of madness which makes them fall into sexual practices or even addictions.

Reference

Kerouac, J. (1999). On the Road. 1957.