Rating: 
Summary: I gotta go
Review: Simply put, this book will make you live a little bit more. I want to get out and go now. I want to have my own experience out there on the great American continent and find my own "Denver" and "Frisco" so to speak. This is a must read.I can't say anything more. There really isn't much else to say.
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Summary: A BOOK FOR EVERY AMERICAN
Review: A great read from cover to cover, especially if you need a little adventure about a time before yours. I was born in the late 70s, thisbook made me want t be alive durin the late 40s.
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Summary: On Literature, Conformity, and the Passing of Time andStYlEs
Review: It's to laugh, it's to laugh. . . Thirty-four years ago, I read this book for a book report, and got alot of flack and incomprehension for it, both from teacher and students. Now it's standard reading fare for all and sundry. It's the hip thing to do, and if you aren't reading Kerouac, there must be something wrong with you. "What were once vices are now necessities. . ." Not too long ago, the original manuscript for the book sold for a fortune. Would that had happened back in 1968, when I was giving my book report! The tone of my classmates and idiot teacher would have been different. It's to laugh, it's to laugh. . . All read Kerouac now, and some swear by him. Yet few seem to know that Jack Kerouac was a Viet Nam War Hawk, and supported the US war effort in Viet Nam to the day of his death. You don't believe me? Don't just shake your head incredulous. Look it up! On top of it all, he was a Merchant Marine, for God's sake. It's to laugh, it's to laugh. . . Yet I've since grown out of the Ivy League "beats", and resort now to the classics. Joyce, Proust, Musil, Aeschylus, Rabelais, Cervantes. . .I wonder if they'll be hip and cool thirty-four years from now? It's to laugh, It's to laugh. . . Yet I disagree that ON THE ROAD is a bad book. It's as good as alot of things. Didn't make me any smarter though. Yet I also liked LONESOME TRAVELER and SATORI IN PARIS. Poetry enjoyable, too. Who am I to deny you?
Rating: 
Summary: On the road again, and so on and so on...
Review: Really great writing and everything, but I was rather disappointed by the end of the book. In the beginning, it was great - the wild adventures of hitchhiking across America, meeting all sorts of interesting people, and scenery and cityscapes, that was all great and interesting - that was all Part One. Then Part Two is pretty much the same, a revision, a review, going back to visit one more time, and again so in Part Three, etc. Each time wilder, faster, drunker, crazier, uglier, digging like madmen, digging for more 'kicks,' and more kicks. By the end, I felt only dazed and slightly bored. The writing, however, is most of the time superb and poetic, with some very deep insights, and at first I thought that that came from the free spirit of adventure. Later, I began to suspect that maybe all this poetry was simply wrought from drunken revelry and nonsensical whooey. I mean, by Part Four all it is is binge drinking in basements, lying stoned in littered New Orleans slums, driving fast in stolen cars and wrecked cars, ending up in a Mexican brothel. And it's just one more binge, one more kick of cocaine, one more divorce, one more abandoned child, one more estranged wife, one more estranged friend, etc! So really, I could connect with this book to begin with- Part One,Two only really - and then I just couldn't, because it just felt too artifically stimulating, not so much an adventure but a hallucination.
Rating:
Summary: Inspirational and fun
Review: A book that will make you want to go out on the road. It just shows the greatness in spontinaity and adventure. One of my all time favorite books that i have recommended to all my friends and bought for three of them. It is about life and the ups and downs and the inbetweens. Jack kerouac is a master of prose and revealing the american spirit. and he does it here in this book better than done before or since. American literature at its best.
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Summary: go2library
Review: On the road by Jack Kerouac is a classic American tale of the hitchhikers of the beat generation. I found Kerouacs frantic writing style to be a perfect match for the mood and content of the book. It really makes you feel as if you're floating across the country like the charictors in the book. Sal and Dean take repeated road trips across the country to wherever for whatever. They are on the never ending frantic search for the something we all crave, and they always almost have it. I've heard kerouac's style be compared to a horn blowing bop, hitting you line by line. Anyone who likes to read, or doesn't like to read, should check this book out from their library because Kerouac is dead, so he sure as hell won't get any of the profits if you buy it.
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Summary: Beat Generation Still Has Heart
Review: Kerouac's vibrant introduction to the Beat Generation still resonates today. I am a fan of Jazz music and so reading Kerouac is a treat because his prose has a vibe and flow not found in most literature. Now that summer is arriving treat yourself to this book and enjoy the trip. A great road adventure novel awaits...
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Summary: Off the Map
Review: In this book, Sal and Dean fraternally bond in their paternal losses using quick and fun adventures across the American continent. To Sal, Dean is also a symbol of sexual energy, rescuing friends from the doldrums of their lives and striking various relationships with women. Rather than "angels", they are really immature in how they use women and each other; furthermore, Dean seems to abandon his children just as his father abandoned him. I find it hard to sympathize with Dean, as Sal continually petitions us to, and embrace the misery portrayed in the BEAT generation characters.
Just as their excursions are choppy so is the writing, which takes a bit getting used to. Only towards the end of the book does the author improve his grammar and style.
I may think about some of the nice moments the people enjoyed during their travels, but I would think there are better adventure stories with equally complex characters and delivered with just as much passion out there.
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Summary: Travelogue and Timepiece
Review: This is an interesting view of a particular time and subculture--specifically, the Beats (named thus by Kerouac) and the 1950's. Here we see the fictional counterparts of Kerouac, Ginsburg, Burroughs, Dean Moriarty, and others. A compelling read; highly recommended.
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Summary: not just the beat bible but a monument in literature
Review: This is an amazing book. Especially when read in a sterile modern world such as the present. It just gets better with time. keroucs character sketches are just as good as faulker or hemingway. I could go on and praise K. and the color this book has, but it would do it no justice. After reading this I realized I need to get a hardback version becuase its gonna get read a lot. Everyone must read this book!
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