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16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Brilliant, flawless story-great for the bohemian idealist!, 3 May 2005
Its a cliche, but I can't even begin to describe how this book effected and changed me, both emotionally and in my own personal outlook. In my opinion, this is how heart felt literature should be - enigmatic, intuitive and inventful. The whole Beat movement is responsible for so many modern day characteristics both in literature, music and film. Everyone seems to enjoy revelling in the nostalgia of the 'Swinging 60's' and 'Free Love', but this is really where it all started, much earlier on, in the mid-50's. Kerouac and co. are responsible for setting up and revolutinising all the liberal 'bohemian' ethoses that we have come to acknowledge and take for granted. Essentially this book is a semi-autobigraphical travel log, but it is also so much more. It suceeds on every level, as a simple narrative, as a social and political statement and as a diary of one man's adventure and self-discovery. This is the original 'Easy Rider' for the 1950's Jazz and bebop lovers. Essential for everyone, whether your a bookworm or a casual page browser. Buy and enjoy, and then read it again, again and again! You'll thank me later!
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15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Live each day to the full, 11 Feb 2005
This is a book that I have read many times, and each time I have loved it even more. Although the story is brilliant, this book is more about how it makes you feel whilst reading it, as well as after. It makes you want to get off of life's treadmill of work, telly, eat, sleep and to get out there and really 'live'. To make memories, stories, adventures, and to stay far from the mundane.
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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An Expansion of Consciousness!, 2 Sep 2004
In the errant, glowing review for the New York Times when it was first published, On The Road garnered comparisons with The Sun Also Rises by Hemingway, and with good reason -- it chronicled a "lost generation" eager to grasp at life (WWI for Hemingway's book, WWII for Kerouac's book) and expressed it in a whole new fresh way. Both books are quite lively, full of explosive description and off-the-cuff dialogue that renders the experience in a quasi-documentary-style way: that is, both books PUT YOU THERE, in the moment. While Hemingway went on to spectacular success, embraced by Academia (but not always by the critics), Kerouac's trajectory was a lot darker. Critics (even the New York Times published a "retraction" of that initial glowing review one week later and now referred to him as a "Neanderthal with a typewriter") and Academics went out of their way to bash his spontaneously bop prosody style. No matter. Although it was shame that Kerouac (as most artists) needed to be crucified in the media, his books, his accomplishments remain. And this book, On The Road, certainly stands as one of his greatest achievements, being an expression of a cry for freedom and nonconformity -- as well as a reinvention of literary style. Possibly this would've be published as "memoir" if it appeared today. Regardless, Kerouac is a jazz poet of the highest order, his spontaneity and agility of style famously influenced by the freewheeling freedom of jazz. The descriptive passages in this book of jazz music, alone, are worth the price of this book. ( See that passage of Sal and Dean discussing the ephemeral "it," and you'll have some idea.) Even the structure of the novel is original. What can I say, this is a unique and marvelous reading experience, an explosion and heart and vigor and youth -- one experience that should not be missed! Two other quick recommendations are the Subterraneans by Kerouac and The Losers Club by Richard Perez. Enjoy these books and taste life!
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