Jack Kerouac-- Dharma Bum

Jan 15 05:20 UTC 1995

Since everybody has been asking me, I thought this would be a good conference
to explain my handle.  Jack Kerouac was a disturbed yoiung man who died far too
young but not before redefining modern conceptions of how to write. Kerouac was
blessed with the gift of being able to see the true beauty of the world and
also its dark side with equal clarity.  His books are technically fiction but
he was essentially a non-fiction writer.  He beieved that you cant write what
you dont know.  That youhave to live and experience life in order to write
about it.  He also believed that a good writer notices everything, absolutely
everything.  He believed that there was a profound goodness in people. Some
people want to write about far off lands and romances they never had.  Jack
Kerouac wanted to write about his friends and about his love for them, and
about how we are all lost souls on a quest for meaning and truth. He believed
that the quest was what life was for, that the quest was all that mattered. 
Later in his life Kerouac got trapped by his own fame and the realitier
realities of his own catholic upbinging.  That was someting he could never
overcome.

My using his name as a handle is no sort of ego trip but rather a recognition
that we should all be visionaries on a quest for truth and meaning.  In
literary lingo, a "kerouac" is a lost soul who has found the road home.
                                        KEROUAC (Richard W.)
And if anybody hasnt read On the Road, Dharma Bums, Subterraneans, Big Sur,.
Visions of Cody a and and  
 
Among others, you should, and I would envy you reading them for the first time.

response 2 of 5:

Jan 15 11:51 UTC 1995

(Not to drift too much, but a reader can cause someone's text to be
reformatted on their screen by typing    define pager 'fmt|more'
before reading.  That makes Russell's text much more readable for
me.  Now back to your regularly scheduled Jack Kerouac item...)

Hmm, I was in adolescence and early adulthood during the Beat
era, but never got around to reading much of its literature.
I recently acquired _On the Road_, though, so maybe I'll give it
a shot.

response 4 of 5:

Jan 17 02:43 UTC 1995

I'm very new to this whole e-mail thing, but I am eager to participate, espec
especially in this forum.  I have read several of the authors you've listed
and would love to respond .  But I've been clunking around this system like
a caveman.  Help?  cadet940886@yogi.nmmi.cc.nm.us

PS  I just got a copy of of Kerouac's works in the mail.  Ideas?