Big Sur by Jack Kerouac Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Big Sur
Book Review: The Other Side of The Beats
Summary: 4 Stars
This was a very interesting read. Just as Kerouac wrote the book in a very short period time, I read the book in a very short period. One and a half days, for me, is a short time to read an entire novel. Interesting how Jack finds himself in the deepest stages of depression, but is still able to come back.Book Review: This may be the best of all Kerouac books.
Summary: 5 Stars
It has been about seven years since I have read this book, but it remains my favorite book by my favorite author of novels. The reason I give this review is because I am about to embark on a critical analysis of it for class. I hope that I come out of this sea of emotion with my breath still even! Out of all of his books this one portrays the crux of Kerouac's life dilemma. If one wants to read unbridled travel narrative, then s/he should go to "On the Road". If one wants to capture all the splendor of the youthful Beat mysticism at its prime, then "Dharma Bums" is likely the best bet. For sheer emotiveness, however, "Big Sur" is possibly without parallel in American literature.
There is one scene that overflows with passion and entreaty to the cosmos. He is involved in a tortuous love affair as he attempts to get off of alcohol. All of this yearning and pathos piles into his psyche and all his mind can do is scream. I don't know about all of the rest of us, but this is a way that I have felt in my life. I am glad there is a novelist like Kerouac who succeeded in publicizing the essential anguish of the American tradition.
If anyone wants to correspond with me on the matter of this book and others by him, please do so. Fresh and contemporary voices will add immeasurable breadth and meaning to my research project. Good day!
Book Review: Tilting the bottle at Big Sur
Summary: 4 Stars
A very good and heartfelt book. One of Kerouac's best. Brave and awful in it's honesty... The cabin at Big Sur, Mien Mo Mountain, the beatniks of San Francisco, the fog, the surf, the canyons, the author sitting on the rocks alongside the Pacific Ocean and writing down all that the ocean tells him, the paranoid ravages of alcohol delirium tremens, the wild imaginings of all those evil forces out to get him, the agonizing, the haunting, the warlocks and the UFOs...Poor Jack suffered through it all--but by his on volition! Most of the time he was only "marginally there" but he still composed himself long enough for the writing of this novel. At the end of it all you wonder how he ever did it.--Alex Sydorenko, Chicago, 2001.Book Review: Whew!
Summary: 5 Stars
A quick, breathless read from the reluctant "King of the Beats." Plot: Jack goes to cabin in Big Sur, spends 3 weeks alone, has brush with insanity, gets bored, goes into town and spends a hundred pages romping with Cody (Neal Cassady) and some of the usual gang, then returns to cabin with Cody's mistress and another couple and goes completely berserk from alcohol delirium tremens. His descriptions of his hallucinations and dreams are unparalleled. The guy just lays everything out on the page. You find yourself wanting to just reach into the book and give poor Jack a big hug, tell him everything's going to be OK, we all love you and want the best for you. The man was completely egoless. It's ironic how the fame he acquired as a "beatnik" prevented him from living a true beat life, which essentially means living as authentically as possible. People confuse it with the clothing, mannerisms, hep talk, which when you read Jack you realize was just a lot of condescending media hype. This book, as with Jack's life, was a constant dance between total bliss and complete despair, and you'll get plenty of book in this superbly written and very readable testament to the human condition.Book Review: another printed masterpiece from the mind of kerouac
Summary: 5 Stars
How many authors can write a book that you can read off and on and go back to without having to go back and reread. Great for busy people