Big Sur by Jack Kerouac By Steve Rudd

It's the little things that count. On my deathbed I could be remembering that creek day and forgetting the day MGM bought my book.

Another classic novel from Beat-generation master Kerouac, Big Sur brings the reader up to speed on how the writer coped following the publication of his legendary novel On The Road and all the intense pressure that such a literary success brought with it. Essentially Big Sur recalls time that he spent - both alone and with friends - at the place of the same name on the Californian coast, as he tried his best to escape visitors, reporters, snoopers who seemingly wanted a piece of Kerouac because they so admired his writing talents.

Ah, life is a gate, a way, a path to Paradise anyway, why not live for fun and joy and love. Compared to On The Road though, this Big Sur chapter in his life is - for the large part - far darker in nature and reflects the fact that the success of the former novel almost sent him spiralling head-first into gross insanity. Throughout much of Big Sur, Kerouac seems obsessed with mortality, as bleak and often sublimely abstract insights into how his mind works swell forth. Still, this book isn't as depressing as it might sound and is in truth somehow uplifting because mortality is acknowledged with such tender intimacy. .. As far as I can see the world is too old for us to talk about it with our new words - We will pass just as quietly through life (passing through, passing through) as the 10th century people of this valley only with a little more noise and a few bridges and dams and bombs that wont even last a million years. Throughout, Kerouac's trademark writing style seethes with brilliance, his poetic prose being utterly captivating and beautifully philosophical. Kerouac was a great thinker for sure, and very fond of being left along for prolonged periods of time to indeed think and reflect on life and love. What's more, he possessed an amazing ability to convey whatever he felt onto paper. For all time, and for the rest of the world to relish, and for that we have to be thankful. It always makes me proud to love the world somehow - Hate's so easy compared.

ISBN 0-099-44858-0 (first published in the UK by The Harvill Press in 2001) www.fireandwater.com

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