On the Road: The Original Scroll
by Jack Kerouac
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Book Summary Information
Author: Jack KerouacIntroduction: Joshua Kupetz
Introduction: George Mouratidis
Introduction: Penny Vlagopoulos
Contributor: Howard Cunnell
Edition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2007-08-16
ISBN: 067006355X
Number of pages: 416
Publisher: Viking Adult
Book Reviews of On the Road: The Original Scroll
Book Review: Sal and Dean or Jack and Neal?
Summary: 5 Stars
I've read the published (Sal Paradise/Dean Moriarty) version of "On the Road" at least three times since the early 1970s, but I find that this original 1951 scroll transcription with no paragraph breaks, unexpurgated expletives, and the real names of Kerouac and Cassady and Ginsberg and Burroughs hits harder, moves faster, and is much more immediate in its impact than the traditionally-edited novel. But even though it predates the publication of the finished book by six years, most of my favorite, most memorable, lines and events were there in this first draft. It's a revelation.
The scroll version also brings up questions about the relative merits of memoirs vs. novels and fiction vs. non-fiction that seem very contemporary -- in the nineteen fifties it was more important to be a Novelist if one were to be taken seriously as a writer; you created a fictional universe, you disguised autobiographical names and events (at least nominally), and you would never be forced to appear on Oprah defending the veracity of every subjective recollection in your book.
If you've read the book in its traditional form, read it again in this "new" version (but if you're coming to this indispensible American classic for the first time, then I'd suggest starting with the published version with the well-known noms de route -- everyone should know Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty!)
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