Del-Jack Kerouac 2 Ed: A Biography Second Edition - Softcover

Clark, Tom

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1569248508 ISBN 13: 9781569248508

Publisher: Da Capo Press, 1995

Synopsis

All the components of the Jack Kerouac legend are here: the excesses of alcohol and drugs; the soul-searching; the characters - Neal Cassady and Allen Ginsberg, Gregory Corso and Lucien Carr, John Clellon Holmes and William Burroughs, Jack's mother, Gabrielle, and the other women in Kerouac's life. There is also a record of the travels that became the basis for On the Road and Visions of Cody, the death-shrouded childhood that became Mexico City Blues and Tristessa, and the stupor of fame that weighed on him as he tried to articulate his torments in Big Sur.

About this title

From School Library Journal:

YA-Kerouac's frenzied but futile search for meaning-or at least sensation-is documented in near-voyeuristic detail in this disturbing biography. It opens with a brief history of the writer's hometown, Lowell, MA, and his working-class family. YAs follow him to prep school and then Columbia University, where he played football, took up writing, and explored the seamy side of New York before dropping out. Readers meet the many women he loved or at least made love to, including, eventually, the wife of his best friend, Neal Cassady. (She provides the book's foreword.) They learn about the chaotic, uneven creation of his literary style and works, but little about what they say. They watch as his reckless, drug-fueled trips on various roads (literal and metaphorical) become less and less purposeful. Fans of Kerouac who have seen him as a champion of freedom and spontaneity are likely to be sobered and disillusioned by this unsparing look at a talented man whose life was a rush to nowhere. Ironically, the book is beautifully produced, with full-page color reproductions of Kerouac book jackets, interesting black-and-white photographs of varying quality, and outstanding layout and graphics.
Jan Tarasovic, West Springfield High School, Fairfax County, VA
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Da Capo Press
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 1569248508
• ISBN 13: 9781569248508
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 254