WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.780 Welcome back to the Deep Dive, where we take 00:00:01.780 --> 00:00:04.379 a stack of source material, peel back the layers 00:00:04.379 --> 00:00:07.200 on the cultural icons who shaped the world, and 00:00:07.200 --> 00:00:09.919 really try to extract to the real story. That's 00:00:09.919 --> 00:00:12.160 right. Today, we are undertaking a deep dive 00:00:12.160 --> 00:00:15.439 into the life of the novelist and poet who is 00:00:15.439 --> 00:00:19.070 just... synonymous with youthful rebellion, the 00:00:19.070 --> 00:00:22.230 open road, and spontaneous creation. We're talking 00:00:22.230 --> 00:00:24.850 about Jack Kerouac. We are. But the Jack Kerouac 00:00:24.850 --> 00:00:27.870 we think we know, you know, the hedonistic, perpetually 00:00:27.870 --> 00:00:29.769 wandering figure, that's really only half the 00:00:29.769 --> 00:00:32.450 story. Right. Our mission today is to conduct 00:00:32.450 --> 00:00:35.950 a really comprehensive exploration of Jean -Louis 00:00:35.950 --> 00:00:38.469 Lebrie de Kerouac. He was a pioneer of the Beat 00:00:38.469 --> 00:00:40.710 Generation, of course, alongside William S. Burroughs 00:00:40.710 --> 00:00:42.630 and Allen Ginsberg. The big three. The big three. 00:00:42.869 --> 00:00:45.409 But he was also, and this is the key, simultaneously 00:00:46.060 --> 00:00:48.539 deeply rooted in French -Canadian Catholicism 00:00:48.539 --> 00:00:52.479 and what is for many a startling political conservatism. 00:00:52.500 --> 00:00:54.539 It's a huge contradiction. And if you're looking 00:00:54.539 --> 00:00:57.140 for the learner's shortcut to Kerouac, it pretty 00:00:57.140 --> 00:00:59.439 much begins and ends with On the Road. Of course. 00:00:59.500 --> 00:01:02.460 His 1957 novel that brought him, I mean, overnight 00:01:02.460 --> 00:01:05.459 fame and cemented his legacy as the voice of 00:01:05.459 --> 00:01:08.159 a generation searching for truth in movement. 00:01:08.879 --> 00:01:12.939 The themes are just. They're undeniable. Jazz, 00:01:13.260 --> 00:01:16.040 drugs, travel, poverty. But that's a surface 00:01:16.040 --> 00:01:18.280 reading, isn't it? That kind of superficial take 00:01:18.280 --> 00:01:21.879 misses the fundamental constant exploration running 00:01:21.879 --> 00:01:25.019 just beneath the hood. Kerouac's work is a spiritual 00:01:25.019 --> 00:01:27.879 quest. Always. It's a continuous tension between 00:01:27.879 --> 00:01:30.579 his Catholic spirituality and a later, very intense 00:01:30.579 --> 00:01:33.400 study of Buddhism. He wasn't just seeking kicks, 00:01:33.599 --> 00:01:35.819 which is what critics always threw at him. He 00:01:35.819 --> 00:01:38.019 was seeking salvation. And that tension, that's 00:01:38.019 --> 00:01:40.340 what leads us to the crucial cognitive dissonance 00:01:40.340 --> 00:01:42.340 at the heart of his whole identity. I mean, he 00:01:42.340 --> 00:01:44.379 gave the world the language and the aesthetic 00:01:44.379 --> 00:01:47.430 for the 1960s counterculture, the hippies. and 00:01:47.430 --> 00:01:49.629 yet he utterly rejected the very movement he 00:01:49.629 --> 00:01:51.650 helped create. He did. He was the progenitor 00:01:51.650 --> 00:01:53.989 who became antagonistic toward the political 00:01:53.989 --> 00:01:56.189 radicalism of his own literary children. It's 00:01:56.189 --> 00:01:58.090 fascinating. He was the ultimate square peg in 00:01:58.090 --> 00:02:00.409 the beat hole. He really was. He was celebrated 00:02:00.409 --> 00:02:03.590 as this great revolutionary, yet he remained 00:02:03.590 --> 00:02:06.650 an anti -communist traditionalist who insisted, 00:02:07.010 --> 00:02:09.550 and I'm quoting here, I'm a Catholic, not a beatnik. 00:02:09.870 --> 00:02:13.319 So our source material today is vast. We're drawing 00:02:13.319 --> 00:02:18.159 on biographies, his, what, 13 novels, and volumes 00:02:18.159 --> 00:02:20.900 of poetry. Yeah, a lot to get through. And we're 00:02:20.900 --> 00:02:23.159 going to use it all to map the distance between 00:02:23.159 --> 00:02:28.159 his public image and his intensely private. paradoxical 00:02:28.159 --> 00:02:30.639 worldview. OK, let's do it. OK, let's unpack 00:02:30.639 --> 00:02:32.520 this by starting at the beginning, because the 00:02:32.520 --> 00:02:34.860 roots of this paradox are buried deep in Lowell, 00:02:34.919 --> 00:02:38.520 Massachusetts. And in a language many people 00:02:38.520 --> 00:02:40.439 just don't associate with the great American 00:02:40.439 --> 00:02:43.219 novelist. Exactly. Kerouac was born on March 00:02:43.219 --> 00:02:46.740 12th, 1922, to French -Canadian parents Léo Alcide 00:02:46.740 --> 00:02:49.479 Kerouac and Gabrielle Ange Levesque. And this 00:02:49.479 --> 00:02:51.900 is absolutely critical to understanding him. 00:02:52.039 --> 00:02:53.840 The background. He wasn't just a French heritage. 00:02:53.939 --> 00:02:56.159 He was raised speaking French, or what he called 00:02:56.159 --> 00:02:59.180 Joie. which is the specific Quebecois vernacular. 00:02:59.199 --> 00:03:00.780 That was his first language. So he didn't even 00:03:00.780 --> 00:03:03.319 speak English at first? No, not at all. That's 00:03:03.319 --> 00:03:06.919 a profound linguistic foundation. He only began 00:03:06.919 --> 00:03:09.560 learning English around age six, and by all accounts, 00:03:09.620 --> 00:03:12.180 he spoke with a noticeable, marked French -Canadian 00:03:12.180 --> 00:03:15.300 accent well into his late teens. Which means 00:03:15.300 --> 00:03:19.180 the fundamental structure of his interior monologue, 00:03:19.319 --> 00:03:23.199 the rhythm of his thought, was shaped by this 00:03:23.199 --> 00:03:26.020 Francophone world. Right, not the dominant American 00:03:26.020 --> 00:03:29.219 one. It explains so much about his later experiments 00:03:29.219 --> 00:03:31.780 with sound and spontaneity in his writing. So 00:03:31.780 --> 00:03:34.379 when he's looking for a voice, he's almost filtering 00:03:34.379 --> 00:03:37.319 English. through the cadence of a different language. 00:03:37.479 --> 00:03:39.099 I think that's a perfect way to put it. And you 00:03:39.099 --> 00:03:41.280 see how deep this connection remained. Towards 00:03:41.280 --> 00:03:43.139 the end of his life, when he's just overwhelmed 00:03:43.139 --> 00:03:46.060 by fame and disappointment, he expressed this 00:03:46.060 --> 00:03:48.460 desperate desire to reconnect with his parents' 00:03:48.599 --> 00:03:50.719 native tongue. And he actually did write in his 00:03:50.719 --> 00:03:53.879 writing. He did. In 2016, we saw the posthumous 00:03:53.879 --> 00:03:57.199 publication of La Vie et Dommage, a volume collecting 00:03:57.199 --> 00:03:59.719 previously unpublished works that he wrote entirely 00:03:59.719 --> 00:04:02.900 in French. Yeah, these included the novella Sur 00:04:02.900 --> 00:04:05.900 le Chemin and La Nuit et ma Femme. This wasn't 00:04:05.900 --> 00:04:08.319 just, you know, some sentimental whim. He was 00:04:08.319 --> 00:04:11.060 actively creating in this unique linguistic space. 00:04:11.259 --> 00:04:14.419 And how was his French? academic? No, that's 00:04:14.419 --> 00:04:16.800 the interesting part. He often disregarded standard 00:04:16.800 --> 00:04:19.319 French grammar in favor of phonetics just to 00:04:19.319 --> 00:04:23.120 capture that raw spoken Canuck French dialect 00:04:23.120 --> 00:04:25.139 of his childhood. He was always chasing authenticity. 00:04:25.639 --> 00:04:28.139 Always. And his ancestry was part of his self 00:04:28.139 --> 00:04:30.860 mythologizing, too. While his father was a potato 00:04:30.860 --> 00:04:33.740 farmer from Quebec, Kerouac claimed all these 00:04:33.740 --> 00:04:36.699 varying, often romanticized origins for his surname. 00:04:36.939 --> 00:04:40.720 Like what? Oh, you know, Irish, Breton or Cornish. 00:04:40.860 --> 00:04:43.250 He even tried to relate it to the Cornish language. 00:04:43.490 --> 00:04:46.050 It's like this constant search for a deeper, 00:04:46.110 --> 00:04:48.670 more romantic pedigree than the harsh reality 00:04:48.670 --> 00:04:50.870 of working -class Lowell. But this spiritual 00:04:50.870 --> 00:04:52.810 bedrock, that came from his mother, Gabrielle. 00:04:52.970 --> 00:04:55.290 Absolutely. She was a deeply devout Catholic, 00:04:55.589 --> 00:04:58.350 the only woman, Kerouac later claimed, that he 00:04:58.350 --> 00:05:00.850 ever truly loved. And this is where the lifelong 00:05:00.850 --> 00:05:04.009 suffering narrative really begins. It is. The 00:05:04.009 --> 00:05:06.029 family was devastated by the death of his older 00:05:06.029 --> 00:05:08.410 brother, Gerard, from rheumatic fever at age 00:05:08.410 --> 00:05:12.500 nine in 1926. Gerard's Death wasn't just a tragedy 00:05:12.500 --> 00:05:15.220 for the family. For Jack, he internalized it 00:05:15.220 --> 00:05:19.040 as a profound, sanctified loss. He later immortalized 00:05:19.040 --> 00:05:21.839 him as this saintly figure in visions of Gerard. 00:05:21.939 --> 00:05:24.879 Yes. And the sources detail this one moment that 00:05:24.879 --> 00:05:28.699 essentially scripted Kerouac's entire life. His 00:05:28.699 --> 00:05:31.579 first confession in 1928 when he was just six 00:05:31.579 --> 00:05:33.819 years old. This is an incredible story. It is. 00:05:33.920 --> 00:05:36.480 For penance, he claimed to hear God speaking 00:05:36.480 --> 00:05:39.899 directly to him. At six years old. At six. Telling 00:05:39.899 --> 00:05:42.120 him he had a good soul, but, and this is the 00:05:42.120 --> 00:05:44.399 core of it, that he was predestined to suffer 00:05:44.399 --> 00:05:47.379 in life and die in pain and horror, though ultimately 00:05:47.379 --> 00:05:49.839 he would receive salvation. That's less a religious 00:05:49.839 --> 00:05:52.259 experience and more a psychological manifesto 00:05:52.259 --> 00:05:54.800 for his whole life. I mean, how could you possibly 00:05:54.800 --> 00:05:57.439 live a mundane existence with that kind of prophecy 00:05:57.439 --> 00:05:59.540 hanging over you? You couldn't. It's an impossible 00:05:59.540 --> 00:06:01.720 weight. It essentially gave him a theological 00:06:01.720 --> 00:06:04.319 justification for the chaotic path he would eventually 00:06:04.319 --> 00:06:07.800 take. The suffering was mandated, but the salvation 00:06:07.800 --> 00:06:10.480 was guaranteed. So when he later integrates Buddhist 00:06:10.480 --> 00:06:13.319 concepts of suffering, dukkha, and detachment, 00:06:13.800 --> 00:06:16.879 It wasn't him rejecting Catholicism. Not at all. 00:06:16.920 --> 00:06:19.920 It was a perfect, tailored fit. The search for 00:06:19.920 --> 00:06:22.279 detachment in Buddhism dovetailed perfectly with 00:06:22.279 --> 00:06:24.459 the Catholic concept of accepting penance and 00:06:24.459 --> 00:06:27.319 seeking grace through suffering. It's a powerful 00:06:27.319 --> 00:06:30.000 narrative of cosmic destiny. And his father, 00:06:30.160 --> 00:06:32.920 Leo, he went the other way after Gerard's death. 00:06:33.120 --> 00:06:35.160 Completely. He abandoned his faith entirely, 00:06:35.459 --> 00:06:39.019 chose drinking, gambling, a path of just cynical 00:06:39.019 --> 00:06:42.160 dissipation. Kerouac consciously chose the suffering 00:06:42.160 --> 00:06:44.810 and seeking path. instead of the outright rejection 00:06:44.810 --> 00:06:48.069 his father took. Before he became the great spiritual 00:06:48.069 --> 00:06:51.720 wanderer, he was a physically gifted kid. A jock, 00:06:51.720 --> 00:06:53.740 really. Yeah, this often surprises people. He 00:06:53.740 --> 00:06:56.139 was a capable athlete, played football and wrestled, 00:06:56.160 --> 00:06:57.800 and earned a scholarship offer that ultimately 00:06:57.800 --> 00:07:00.939 landed him at Columbia University in 1940. But 00:07:00.939 --> 00:07:04.259 his time at Columbia was brief. Very brief. He 00:07:04.259 --> 00:07:06.360 broke his leg during his freshman football season. 00:07:06.579 --> 00:07:09.040 By his sophomore year, he was arguing constantly 00:07:09.040 --> 00:07:11.579 with the coach, Lou Little, and just dropped 00:07:11.579 --> 00:07:13.980 out entirely. He did spend a short time later 00:07:13.980 --> 00:07:16.139 at the new school, but Columbia was done. But 00:07:16.139 --> 00:07:19.500 Columbia was pivotal for one reason. The connections. 00:07:19.740 --> 00:07:22.720 Absolutely. While there, he befriended Seymour 00:07:22.720 --> 00:07:25.620 Wise, who later becomes Lionel Smart in his books. 00:07:25.740 --> 00:07:28.519 And Wise was instrumental in introducing him 00:07:28.519 --> 00:07:31.740 to avant -garde jazz, especially the new radical 00:07:31.740 --> 00:07:34.120 sounds of bop. This is the moment the intellectual 00:07:34.120 --> 00:07:37.500 engine starts revving. It really is. Bebop, with 00:07:37.500 --> 00:07:41.480 its frantic, nonlinear improvisations, its speed, 00:07:41.800 --> 00:07:44.800 its intellectual challenge, that was the sonic 00:07:44.800 --> 00:07:47.120 blueprint for his future writing. The rhythm 00:07:47.120 --> 00:07:48.720 he needed to match the speed of his thought. 00:07:48.779 --> 00:07:51.259 Exactly. He was trading the rigid structures 00:07:51.259 --> 00:07:53.720 of the gridiron and the Catholic mass for the 00:07:53.720 --> 00:07:56.420 unstructured freedom of Charlie Parker and Dizzy 00:07:56.420 --> 00:07:58.579 Gillespie. So you have the foundation right there. 00:07:58.699 --> 00:08:01.279 The French rhythm. the Catholic suffering narrative, 00:08:01.420 --> 00:08:04.240 and the revolutionary energy of bop jazz. A very 00:08:04.240 --> 00:08:06.500 volatile combination. So dropping out of Columbia 00:08:06.500 --> 00:08:08.379 meant staying in New York's Upper West Side. 00:08:08.480 --> 00:08:10.740 Right. In this intellectually charged yet highly 00:08:10.740 --> 00:08:13.459 chaotic environment of the city. This is the 00:08:13.459 --> 00:08:16.459 true birthplace of the beat generation. This 00:08:16.459 --> 00:08:18.920 is where Kerouac becomes inseparable from Allen 00:08:18.920 --> 00:08:21.680 Ginsberg, Neal Cassidy. The future Dean Moriarty. 00:08:21.930 --> 00:08:24.370 The one and only. And William S. Burroughs and 00:08:24.370 --> 00:08:27.050 Lucian Carr. This is the core group. And their 00:08:27.050 --> 00:08:29.550 collective identity as these literary outlaws. 00:08:29.709 --> 00:08:33.470 It was violently cemented in 1944. Yes. By the 00:08:33.470 --> 00:08:36.769 camera murder. A shocking formative event that 00:08:36.769 --> 00:08:39.110 put all of them under police scrutiny. So what 00:08:39.110 --> 00:08:41.470 happened exactly? Lucien Carr murdered David 00:08:41.470 --> 00:08:44.149 Kammerer. Carr claimed it was self -defense against 00:08:44.149 --> 00:08:46.970 what he described as Kammerer's aggressive, obsessive 00:08:46.970 --> 00:08:49.830 homosexual pursuit. He stabbed him with a scout 00:08:49.830 --> 00:08:52.669 knife and, in a fit of panic, dumped the body 00:08:52.669 --> 00:08:55.149 in the Hudson River. And here's where Kerouac 00:08:55.149 --> 00:08:56.809 gets directly implicated. He didn't just know 00:08:56.809 --> 00:08:59.649 about it. No, he helped Carr. He aided the cover 00:08:59.649 --> 00:09:01.830 -up by disposing of the murder weapon and burying 00:09:01.830 --> 00:09:04.309 Kammerer's eyeglasses. It's a moment of desperate, 00:09:04.470 --> 00:09:06.990 confused loyalty among friends in a really intense 00:09:06.990 --> 00:09:10.039 situation. And this led to his arrest. Yes, as 00:09:10.039 --> 00:09:12.320 a material witness. And the sheer desperation 00:09:12.320 --> 00:09:14.700 of the circumstances is captured in how he made 00:09:14.700 --> 00:09:17.259 bail. His traditionalist conservative father, 00:09:17.399 --> 00:09:19.720 Leo, who had already abandoned the faith, he 00:09:19.720 --> 00:09:23.500 just refused to pay. So in a truly bizarre and 00:09:23.500 --> 00:09:26.899 instantly legendary move, Kerouac married his 00:09:26.899 --> 00:09:30.100 girlfriend, Edie Parker. On August 22nd, 1944. 00:09:31.610 --> 00:09:34.230 Because her parents agreed to pay his bail on 00:09:34.230 --> 00:09:36.330 the condition that they marry immediately. A 00:09:36.330 --> 00:09:38.470 marriage of necessity, not love. Completely. 00:09:38.610 --> 00:09:42.149 It was annulled in 1948. But it's an absurdly 00:09:42.149 --> 00:09:44.389 high -stakes anecdote that illustrates the chaos 00:09:44.389 --> 00:09:47.809 the nascent beats inhabited. Life and death were 00:09:47.809 --> 00:09:50.370 intertwined with mundane things like bail money, 00:09:50.570 --> 00:09:53.330 forcing these grand, desperate gestures. And 00:09:53.330 --> 00:09:55.549 crucially, the event was instantly viewed as 00:09:55.549 --> 00:09:58.289 literary material. Right away, Kerouac and Burroughs 00:09:58.289 --> 00:10:00.269 collaborated on the novel, and the hippos were 00:10:00.269 --> 00:10:02.230 boiled in their tanks about the murder. Which 00:10:02.230 --> 00:10:04.669 wasn't published until, what, 2008? That's right. 00:10:04.730 --> 00:10:06.950 But it showed how immediately they recognized 00:10:06.950 --> 00:10:10.320 the dramatic potential of their own lives. Kerouac 00:10:10.320 --> 00:10:12.580 also mined the experience later in Vanity of 00:10:12.580 --> 00:10:15.759 DeLuis. This formative trauma really defined 00:10:15.759 --> 00:10:18.240 their collective narrative. They were outsiders, 00:10:18.519 --> 00:10:21.159 defined by transgression and loyalty. We should 00:10:21.159 --> 00:10:23.279 probably note that this murder incident was preceded 00:10:23.279 --> 00:10:25.279 by his failed attempts at a more conventional 00:10:25.279 --> 00:10:27.679 life during World War II. Yeah, his military 00:10:27.679 --> 00:10:30.120 service. He had served as a merchant mariner 00:10:30.120 --> 00:10:33.740 from July to October 1942. During that time, 00:10:33.759 --> 00:10:35.700 he wrote his first novel, The Sea is My Brother. 00:10:35.919 --> 00:10:38.779 Which he himself dismissed as a crock as literature. 00:10:39.580 --> 00:10:41.759 Why was he so harsh on it? Because he felt it 00:10:41.759 --> 00:10:44.019 was trying too hard to be a conventional novel 00:10:44.019 --> 00:10:47.000 about man's simple revolt from society as it 00:10:47.000 --> 00:10:49.919 is. He was using a conventional narrative form, 00:10:50.000 --> 00:10:52.639 a form he hadn't yet mastered, to capture a radical 00:10:52.639 --> 00:10:55.340 idea. He hadn't found his voice yet, only his 00:10:55.340 --> 00:10:57.860 theme. It was published posthumously in 2011. 00:10:58.159 --> 00:11:01.139 Right. And his actual military career ended even 00:11:01.139 --> 00:11:05.080 faster in 1943. He served only eight days in 00:11:05.080 --> 00:11:07.379 the U .S. Navy Reserves before being honorably 00:11:07.379 --> 00:11:09.960 discharged on psychiatric grounds. The diagnosis. 00:11:10.320 --> 00:11:13.059 was schizoid personality. Yeah, and his famous 00:11:13.059 --> 00:11:15.139 quote to the medical examiner, I just can't stand 00:11:15.139 --> 00:11:17.779 it, I like to be by myself, it reveals a deliberate 00:11:17.779 --> 00:11:20.379 rejection of conformity, but also, you know, 00:11:20.399 --> 00:11:22.980 perhaps a shrewd manipulation of the system to 00:11:22.980 --> 00:11:25.419 get the solitude he needed for writing. That's 00:11:25.419 --> 00:11:28.399 a challenging question. Was this genuinely debilitating 00:11:28.399 --> 00:11:30.980 antisociality, or was it a convenient excuse 00:11:30.980 --> 00:11:33.399 to avoid the discipline he viewed as antithetical 00:11:33.399 --> 00:11:36.360 to true inspiration? It's hard to say. If he 00:11:36.360 --> 00:11:39.019 craved discipline, which his spiritual life suggested, 00:11:39.690 --> 00:11:41.629 Why reject the physical discipline of the Navy? 00:11:42.149 --> 00:11:44.250 Perhaps the discipline he sought was internal, 00:11:44.529 --> 00:11:47.250 a spiritual structure, not an externally imposed 00:11:47.250 --> 00:11:51.110 secular one. So he retreated. He did. To Ozone 00:11:51.110 --> 00:11:53.690 Park, Queens, living mostly with his parents, 00:11:53.950 --> 00:11:56.529 a period his friends joked about calling him 00:11:56.529 --> 00:11:59.559 the Wizard of Ozone Park. But that solitude produced 00:11:59.559 --> 00:12:01.940 his initial output, including The Town and the 00:12:01.940 --> 00:12:05.240 City, which he wrote between 1946 and 1949, and 00:12:05.240 --> 00:12:07.399 the first conceptualizations of what would become 00:12:07.399 --> 00:12:10.360 the great American road novel. OK, so let's look 00:12:10.360 --> 00:12:12.929 at that first artifact the world saw. The Town 00:12:12.929 --> 00:12:15.370 and the City. Published in 1950 under the name 00:12:15.370 --> 00:12:18.090 John Kerouac. Right. And it was influenced heavily 00:12:18.090 --> 00:12:20.889 by Thomas Wolfe, an author known for these sweeping 00:12:20.889 --> 00:12:24.029 semi -autobiographical generational epics. It's 00:12:24.029 --> 00:12:26.009 a very traditional literary structure. Very. 00:12:26.090 --> 00:12:28.570 It focused on the generational contrast between 00:12:28.570 --> 00:12:30.570 small -town life and the pull of the metropolis. 00:12:30.870 --> 00:12:33.190 But critically, it was heavily, heavily edited. 00:12:33.429 --> 00:12:36.070 His editor, Robert Giroux, convinced him to cut 00:12:36.070 --> 00:12:39.919 roughly 400 pages. 400 pages. Wow. And this experience 00:12:39.919 --> 00:12:43.659 just deeply frustrated Kerouac. He felt his natural, 00:12:43.840 --> 00:12:46.679 expansive voice was being mutilated by conventional 00:12:46.679 --> 00:12:49.919 expectations. That heavy editing really sets 00:12:49.919 --> 00:12:52.559 the stage for the radical departure that was 00:12:52.559 --> 00:12:56.179 On the Road. It was his declaration. His declaration 00:12:56.179 --> 00:12:58.340 that he would never let a conventional editor 00:12:58.340 --> 00:13:01.879 dictate his pace or structure ever again. Precisely. 00:13:01.899 --> 00:13:04.279 So the writing of On the Road in 1951 became 00:13:04.279 --> 00:13:07.419 literary mythology. Total mythology. He completed 00:13:07.419 --> 00:13:10.299 the final draft in a phenomenal 20 days while 00:13:10.299 --> 00:13:12.419 living in Manhattan with his second wife, Joan 00:13:12.419 --> 00:13:14.940 Haverty. The intensity required was immense. 00:13:15.299 --> 00:13:17.399 And the sources detail the physical aids that 00:13:17.399 --> 00:13:19.320 sustained this burst of creative energy. Oh, 00:13:19.340 --> 00:13:21.799 yeah. Joan supplied him with a constant stream 00:13:21.799 --> 00:13:24.480 of benzadrine and amphetamine, along with cigarettes, 00:13:24.759 --> 00:13:27.580 pea soup, and coffee. It was a chemical and dietary 00:13:27.580 --> 00:13:29.940 regime engineered for relentless, continuous 00:13:29.940 --> 00:13:32.320 output. But it's the physical mechanism that 00:13:32.320 --> 00:13:35.139 truly captures the imagination. The scroll. The 00:13:35.139 --> 00:13:37.940 scroll. He'd take sheets of architectural tracing 00:13:37.940 --> 00:13:41.059 paper, these long continuous sheets, into a single 00:13:41.059 --> 00:13:44.379 roll, 120 feet long, and he fed this into his 00:13:44.379 --> 00:13:46.600 typewriter. The purpose was to eliminate the 00:13:46.600 --> 00:13:48.980 slightest interruption. He wanted to maintain 00:13:48.980 --> 00:13:51.639 a pure, unadulterated stream of consciousness 00:13:51.639 --> 00:13:54.840 flow, never having to break concentration to 00:13:54.840 --> 00:13:57.340 reload a page. This was the physical manifestation 00:13:57.340 --> 00:14:00.340 of spontaneous prose. And the scroll itself, 00:14:00.580 --> 00:14:03.259 which was uncensored and used the real names 00:14:03.259 --> 00:14:06.279 of his friends, was a raw document. Very raw. 00:14:06.460 --> 00:14:09.059 When Viking Press finally agreed to publish the 00:14:09.059 --> 00:14:12.139 novel in 1957, after years of rejection and struggle, 00:14:12.379 --> 00:14:15.720 they demanded major revisions. The original scroll 00:14:15.720 --> 00:14:18.690 was just too explicit. its sexual content and 00:14:18.690 --> 00:14:21.330 too risky in its use of real names for fear of 00:14:21.330 --> 00:14:23.889 libel suits. So the famous book that we all read, 00:14:23.929 --> 00:14:26.289 the one published in 1957, was actually the censored 00:14:26.289 --> 00:14:28.649 revised version. Yeah, it was stripped of some 00:14:28.649 --> 00:14:31.149 of its raw edge and used pseudonyms like Dean 00:14:31.149 --> 00:14:34.090 Moriarty for Neil Cassidy. It took until 2007 00:14:34.090 --> 00:14:36.549 for On the Road, the original scroll to finally 00:14:36.549 --> 00:14:39.389 be published, giving the world Kerouac's true 00:14:39.389 --> 00:14:42.710 unedited vision. That scroll later sold for $2 00:14:42.710 --> 00:14:47.490 .43 million. Wow. And we have to revisit Kerouac's 00:14:47.490 --> 00:14:49.750 own description of the book's core theme because 00:14:49.750 --> 00:14:51.750 it explains his fury at how it was received. 00:14:52.090 --> 00:14:54.330 He was avid. It was a story about two Catholic 00:14:54.330 --> 00:14:56.370 buddies roaming the country in search of God. 00:14:56.960 --> 00:14:59.340 He constantly emphasized that Neil Cassidy, the 00:14:59.340 --> 00:15:01.639 primary engine of the road trips, was sweating 00:15:01.639 --> 00:15:04.440 for God. He believed the public and the critics 00:15:04.440 --> 00:15:07.559 completely missed the profound spiritual yearning. 00:15:07.639 --> 00:15:10.220 Completely. They saw only the superficial kicks. 00:15:10.539 --> 00:15:13.120 Which brings us to the formal technique he developed, 00:15:13.320 --> 00:15:16.259 spontaneous prose. This wasn't just random scribbling. 00:15:16.299 --> 00:15:19.059 It was a deeply intellectual synthesized method. 00:15:19.320 --> 00:15:22.210 Derived from two major influences. bebop jazz 00:15:22.210 --> 00:15:25.230 and later buddhist ideas the jazz connection 00:15:25.230 --> 00:15:28.649 is so key it is he wanted to translate the sound 00:15:28.649 --> 00:15:31.269 of a musician's improvised solo what they called 00:15:31.269 --> 00:15:34.889 the lick directly onto the page bebop is fast 00:15:34.889 --> 00:15:37.830 unpredictable and it avoids the predictable cadence 00:15:37.830 --> 00:15:40.659 of traditional composition Kerouac wanted his 00:15:40.659 --> 00:15:42.960 sentences to mimic this. And the Buddhist concept 00:15:42.960 --> 00:15:45.580 he borrowed was breath. Exactly. In meditation, 00:15:45.840 --> 00:15:48.059 the breath is the focus, continuous and flowing. 00:15:48.620 --> 00:15:51.360 Kerouac conceptualized his writing as one long, 00:15:51.360 --> 00:15:54.200 continuous breath, the outflow of the mind. And 00:15:54.200 --> 00:15:56.259 that's why revision was minimized, because it 00:15:56.259 --> 00:15:58.279 would disrupt the original pure expulsion of 00:15:58.279 --> 00:16:01.139 thought. The punctuation reflects this musicality, 00:16:01.159 --> 00:16:03.600 too. Oh, absolutely. He famously eliminated the 00:16:03.600 --> 00:16:06.519 period, which acts as a hard stop. And substituted 00:16:06.519 --> 00:16:09.620 it with a long, connecting dash. Yes. The dash 00:16:09.620 --> 00:16:12.399 creates a bridge between ideas, forcing the reader 00:16:12.399 --> 00:16:14.960 to maintain the relentless pace and rhythm of 00:16:14.960 --> 00:16:18.019 the prose, much like a jazz drummer doesn't completely 00:16:18.019 --> 00:16:21.159 stop between beats. Now, this technique wasn't 00:16:21.159 --> 00:16:23.799 universally loved. Not at all. Truman Capote's 00:16:23.799 --> 00:16:26.480 famous dismissal, that's not writing, it's typing. 00:16:26.639 --> 00:16:29.759 That really encapsulates the conventional literary 00:16:29.759 --> 00:16:33.519 establishment's horror at this seemingly undisciplined 00:16:33.519 --> 00:16:36.379 approach. It does. But it was revolutionary for 00:16:36.379 --> 00:16:40.120 his peers. Allen Ginsberg became his major proponent, 00:16:40.259 --> 00:16:43.100 directly crediting Kerouac's spontaneous method 00:16:43.100 --> 00:16:45.500 with inspiring the structure and composition 00:16:45.500 --> 00:16:48.960 of his landmark poem, Howl. And Kerouac eventually 00:16:48.960 --> 00:16:51.120 formalized this approach, right? It wasn't just 00:16:51.120 --> 00:16:53.720 a vibe. No. He formalized it into 30 detailed 00:16:53.720 --> 00:16:56.279 maxims, published as Belief and Technique for 00:16:56.279 --> 00:16:58.620 Modern Prose. It demonstrates that the method, 00:16:58.740 --> 00:17:01.340 though it might seem chaotic in result, was rigorously 00:17:01.340 --> 00:17:03.860 intellectual in concept. It's also fascinating 00:17:03.860 --> 00:17:06.519 how he returned to his roots using this technique. 00:17:07.049 --> 00:17:10.150 When he wrote fiction in French, he applied the 00:17:10.150 --> 00:17:12.809 same spontaneous approach. Yes, specifically 00:17:12.809 --> 00:17:15.250 relying on phonetics to capture the sound of 00:17:15.250 --> 00:17:18.289 his native dialect. He deliberately ignored standard 00:17:18.289 --> 00:17:21.089 French grammar or spelling in works like Sir 00:17:21.089 --> 00:17:24.250 Le Chemin and La Nuit à ma femme. Which proves 00:17:24.250 --> 00:17:26.490 that the drive for spontaneity was fundamental 00:17:26.490 --> 00:17:29.430 to his personality, not just a gimmick for English 00:17:29.430 --> 00:17:32.880 language rebellion. Exactly. He wanted to capture 00:17:32.880 --> 00:17:35.559 the authentic, unfiltered sound of language, 00:17:35.660 --> 00:17:37.980 whether it was the fast -paced urban rhythm of 00:17:37.980 --> 00:17:40.880 bop or the specific unvarnished sound of his 00:17:40.880 --> 00:17:43.740 childhood tongue. He was inventing a new literary 00:17:43.740 --> 00:17:46.480 vernacular rooted in his deep traditional past. 00:17:46.680 --> 00:17:48.859 So this technical experimentation, this spontaneous 00:17:48.859 --> 00:17:51.619 prose, was completely intertwined with his lifelong 00:17:51.619 --> 00:17:54.180 spiritual hunger. Completely. His interests were 00:17:54.180 --> 00:17:56.920 truly Catholic with a small C. They encompassed 00:17:56.920 --> 00:17:59.359 sacred texts from India and China, alongside 00:17:59.359 --> 00:18:01.920 American literary giants like Emerson and Thoreau. 00:18:02.039 --> 00:18:04.259 And his serious engagement with Buddhism. That 00:18:04.259 --> 00:18:07.380 began in 1954. It was an attempt to synthesize 00:18:07.380 --> 00:18:09.359 his Catholic foundation with a more mystical 00:18:09.359 --> 00:18:12.980 Eastern philosophy. It was. And the trigger was 00:18:12.980 --> 00:18:15.279 discovering Dwight Goddard's A Buddhist Bible 00:18:15.279 --> 00:18:18.839 at the San Jose Library. That book, particularly 00:18:18.839 --> 00:18:22.000 the Diamond Sutra, had a profound impact on him. 00:18:22.079 --> 00:18:24.740 Oh, huge. He considered it one of the most influential 00:18:24.740 --> 00:18:27.380 texts he ever encountered. And he didn't approach 00:18:27.380 --> 00:18:29.960 it casually. He applied the same rigorous discipline 00:18:29.960 --> 00:18:32.619 he once had for Catholicism in football. Really? 00:18:32.759 --> 00:18:35.119 How so? Well, our sources confirm that he studied 00:18:35.119 --> 00:18:38.019 the text intensively, adopting a highly structured, 00:18:38.200 --> 00:18:41.279 repeating weekly cycle. He dedicated one day 00:18:41.279 --> 00:18:43.740 to the study of each of the six paramitas, the 00:18:43.740 --> 00:18:46.420 six perfections, and the seventh day to the concluding 00:18:46.420 --> 00:18:49.589 passage on samadhi, or deep meditation. That 00:18:49.589 --> 00:18:52.650 is methodical. That seven -day cycle of structured 00:18:52.650 --> 00:18:55.410 devotion, it speaks volumes about his need for 00:18:55.410 --> 00:18:58.029 order and discipline, which contrasts so sharply 00:18:58.029 --> 00:19:00.130 with the apparent chaos of his road life. It 00:19:00.130 --> 00:19:02.930 does. And he produced works reflecting this study, 00:19:03.049 --> 00:19:05.450 including some of the Dharma, which was an imaginative 00:19:05.450 --> 00:19:08.069 treatise that blended poetry, prose, and religious 00:19:08.069 --> 00:19:10.849 reflection. He also wrote Wake Up, A Life of 00:19:10.849 --> 00:19:13.210 the Buddha. Yes, a biography of a Buddha which 00:19:13.210 --> 00:19:16.400 was serialized posthumously. And the practical 00:19:16.400 --> 00:19:18.880 application of this spiritual search led him 00:19:18.880 --> 00:19:22.559 to Gary Snyder. The brilliant poet and environmentalist, 00:19:22.579 --> 00:19:25.079 a key figure in the San Francisco literary scene, 00:19:25.259 --> 00:19:28.059 Snyder was a deep practitioner of Zen. And Kerouac 00:19:28.059 --> 00:19:31.029 deeply admired him. Snyder served as the basis 00:19:31.029 --> 00:19:32.950 for the character of J .P. Ryder in the Dharma 00:19:32.950 --> 00:19:35.430 Bums. Right. And following Snyder's lead and 00:19:35.430 --> 00:19:38.250 seeking ultimate solitude and detachment, Kerouac 00:19:38.250 --> 00:19:41.829 took a job in 1956 as a fire lookout on Desolation 00:19:41.829 --> 00:19:44.170 Peak in the North Cascades of Washington. You 00:19:44.170 --> 00:19:46.569 have to imagine the scene. Yeah. Total isolation 00:19:46.569 --> 00:19:48.890 high up in the mountains. And his sole reading 00:19:48.890 --> 00:19:51.349 material during this period was the Diamond Sutra. 00:19:51.769 --> 00:19:54.309 It was the ultimate test of his search for samadhi. 00:19:54.369 --> 00:19:56.869 And that solitude combined with the energy from 00:19:56.869 --> 00:19:59.529 On the Road's success, that's what fueled his 00:19:59.529 --> 00:20:01.809 next major novel. It did. The Dharma Bums was 00:20:01.809 --> 00:20:03.670 written incredibly quickly, between November 00:20:03.670 --> 00:20:06.950 26 and December 7, 1957, in Orlando, Florida. 00:20:07.329 --> 00:20:10.109 He returned the continuous flow method, typing 00:20:10.109 --> 00:20:12.769 the manuscript onto a 10 -foot length of teleprinter 00:20:12.769 --> 00:20:15.490 paper. So in a way, Dharma Bums was his deliberate 00:20:15.490 --> 00:20:18.269 attempt to correct the record. To show the world 00:20:18.269 --> 00:20:20.230 that the beat search was fundamentally spiritual, 00:20:20.410 --> 00:20:23.910 not just reckless. I think so. However, the spiritual 00:20:23.910 --> 00:20:27.119 journey didn't bring peace. The fame following 00:20:27.119 --> 00:20:29.299 on the road meant that his private spiritual 00:20:29.299 --> 00:20:31.759 practices were now subject to public scrutiny 00:20:31.759 --> 00:20:34.599 and criticism. Established figures in American 00:20:34.599 --> 00:20:37.500 Buddhism, like Zen teachers Ruth Fuller Sasaki 00:20:37.500 --> 00:20:40.220 and Alan Watts, they were skeptical of his blend 00:20:40.220 --> 00:20:43.480 of Catholicism, bop, and instant Zen. He felt 00:20:43.480 --> 00:20:45.480 like a monstrous imposter, didn't he? He really 00:20:45.480 --> 00:20:49.460 did. He wrote agonizingly to Snyder about a meeting 00:20:49.460 --> 00:20:52.839 with D .T. Suzuki, the legendary scholar, claiming 00:20:52.839 --> 00:20:55.339 Suzuki looked at him through slitted eyes as 00:20:55.400 --> 00:20:57.859 though I was a monstrous imposter. That's rough. 00:20:58.220 --> 00:21:01.160 This self -doubt, amplified by his escalating 00:21:01.160 --> 00:21:04.740 alcoholism, it led to demoralization. He declined 00:21:04.740 --> 00:21:07.000 an opportunity to reunite with Snyder, explaining 00:21:07.000 --> 00:21:09.420 that he felt too decadent and drunk, that he 00:21:09.420 --> 00:21:11.319 didn't give a shit about his past commitments. 00:21:11.779 --> 00:21:14.440 This self -rejection culminates in his public 00:21:14.440 --> 00:21:17.730 declaration, I'm not a Buddhist anymore. So it 00:21:17.730 --> 00:21:19.650 seems the structure and tradition he found in 00:21:19.650 --> 00:21:21.670 Catholicism and sought in Buddhism were just 00:21:21.670 --> 00:21:23.809 constantly undermined by the freedom and chaos 00:21:23.809 --> 00:21:26.569 that he, paradoxically, celebrated in his own 00:21:26.569 --> 00:21:29.700 writing. And the shift from obscure writer to 00:21:29.700 --> 00:21:33.579 cultural icon was just instantaneous and brutal. 00:21:33.759 --> 00:21:36.960 Right. July 1957. He's just moved into a quiet 00:21:36.960 --> 00:21:39.720 place in Orlando. And Gilbert Milstein's review 00:21:39.720 --> 00:21:41.960 in The New York Times drops. And it didn't just 00:21:41.960 --> 00:21:44.619 review a book. It announced him as the voice 00:21:44.619 --> 00:21:47.079 of a seismic shift, the herald of a new generation. 00:21:47.220 --> 00:21:50.039 And the fame, which you think would be liberating, 00:21:50.119 --> 00:21:53.900 it became a cage. It was an unmanageable surge. 00:21:54.569 --> 00:21:57.710 that by his own account rapidly became his undoing. 00:21:57.920 --> 00:22:00.720 This is where the core paradox really solidifies, 00:22:00.819 --> 00:22:02.740 because he spent the rest of his short life trying 00:22:02.740 --> 00:22:05.140 to dismantle the image the press had created. 00:22:05.299 --> 00:22:07.619 He actively resented the label, the king of the 00:22:07.619 --> 00:22:10.980 beat generation. When confronted, he pushed back 00:22:10.980 --> 00:22:13.819 sharply, stating, I'm not a beatnik, I'm a Catholic. 00:22:14.099 --> 00:22:16.059 To emphasize the point, he even showed a reporter 00:22:16.059 --> 00:22:18.099 a painting he had personally executed of Pope 00:22:18.099 --> 00:22:20.339 Paul VI. He was trying to signal to the world 00:22:20.339 --> 00:22:23.500 that his core loyalty was to tradition, to faith, 00:22:23.640 --> 00:22:26.700 not to the fashionable, messy rebellion he was 00:22:26.700 --> 00:22:28.509 now representing. And the political dimension 00:22:28.509 --> 00:22:31.569 of this conflict was particularly intense. In 00:22:31.569 --> 00:22:34.289 what way? Well, Kerouac was fiercely traditional 00:22:34.289 --> 00:22:37.269 and staunchly anti -communist, which set him 00:22:37.269 --> 00:22:39.490 apart ideologically from peers like Ginsburg, 00:22:39.609 --> 00:22:42.630 who were rapidly moving left. This wasn't a subtle 00:22:42.630 --> 00:22:45.130 drift rightward. This was his lifelong stance. 00:22:45.509 --> 00:22:47.569 And we have firm documentation on his political 00:22:47.569 --> 00:22:49.970 leanings, which, you know, often shocks people 00:22:49.970 --> 00:22:54.279 who only know on the road. It does. In 1952, 00:22:54.380 --> 00:22:57.759 he publicly endorsed Robert A. Taft, who represented 00:22:57.759 --> 00:23:00.660 the conservative, pre -Eisenhower, old right 00:23:00.660 --> 00:23:02.799 of the Republican Party. And the pattern continued. 00:23:03.420 --> 00:23:05.740 Hunter S. Thompson noted that as late as 1964, 00:23:06.339 --> 00:23:09.299 Kerouac was a staunch supporter of the arch -conservative 00:23:09.299 --> 00:23:12.099 Republican candidate Barry Goldwater. William 00:23:12.099 --> 00:23:14.380 S. Burroughs, a close observer, confirmed that 00:23:14.380 --> 00:23:16.859 Kerouac consistently maintained very traditional 00:23:16.859 --> 00:23:20.180 values. always was conservative. It's a fascinating 00:23:20.180 --> 00:23:22.380 dissonance. He embraced the aesthetic freedom 00:23:22.380 --> 00:23:25.559 of jazz, drugs, and sexual exploration, but politically 00:23:25.559 --> 00:23:28.259 and spiritually, he desired rigidity and established 00:23:28.259 --> 00:23:30.700 order. Right. He was against the external constraints 00:23:30.700 --> 00:23:33.180 of society, but for the external constraints 00:23:33.180 --> 00:23:35.279 of faith and flag. He even found himself in a 00:23:35.279 --> 00:23:37.500 peculiar spot during the McCarthy era. A very 00:23:37.500 --> 00:23:40.339 strange spot. He reportedly watched the 1954 00:23:40.339 --> 00:23:43.319 McCarthy hearings while smoking marijuana and 00:23:43.319 --> 00:23:45.740 rooting for Senator Joseph McCarthy. Seriously? 00:23:46.059 --> 00:23:48.829 Seriously. He saw fight against communism as 00:23:48.829 --> 00:23:52.130 a necessary spiritual war. His anti -communism 00:23:52.130 --> 00:23:54.569 was tied up in his Catholicism, viewing it as 00:23:54.569 --> 00:23:57.130 the ultimate materialist evil. And his academic 00:23:57.130 --> 00:23:59.690 disdain for left -wing thought is evident in 00:23:59.690 --> 00:24:02.230 his writing. Very evident. In Desolation Angels, 00:24:02.450 --> 00:24:04.950 he critiques his time at Columbia, noting that 00:24:04.950 --> 00:24:06.829 all they attempted to teach the students was 00:24:06.829 --> 00:24:09.269 Marx, which he dismissed as an illusory tangent. 00:24:09.980 --> 00:24:12.700 classifying Marxism alongside Freudianism as 00:24:12.700 --> 00:24:16.339 distracting secular pseudoscience. And this antagonism 00:24:16.339 --> 00:24:18.559 just boiled over when the hippie counterculture 00:24:18.559 --> 00:24:21.559 emerged in the 1960s. Oh, he saw them as fundamentally 00:24:21.559 --> 00:24:23.799 lacking the spiritual depth and intellectual 00:24:23.799 --> 00:24:26.960 rigor of the original beats. He was openly critical, 00:24:27.160 --> 00:24:29.380 believing the movement was an excuse to be spiteful 00:24:29.380 --> 00:24:31.579 and self -indulgent. He infamously deemed hippies 00:24:31.579 --> 00:24:34.619 mindless, communistic, rude, unpatriotic, and 00:24:34.619 --> 00:24:37.740 soulless. This ideological chasm led to profound 00:24:37.740 --> 00:24:41.430 personal conflict. It did. By 1968, the tension 00:24:41.430 --> 00:24:44.470 resulted in a decisive split with Allen Ginsberg, 00:24:44.670 --> 00:24:47.809 his longtime literary collaborator and confidant. 00:24:48.009 --> 00:24:50.750 It really signaled the fracturing of the original 00:24:50.750 --> 00:24:53.490 beat core. The fame also brought immediate physical 00:24:53.490 --> 00:24:56.509 danger. Yes. After only about nine months as 00:24:56.509 --> 00:24:59.250 a celebrity, he felt profoundly unsafe in public. 00:24:59.839 --> 00:25:02.220 He was badly beaten by three men outside the 00:25:02.220 --> 00:25:05.420 San Remo Cafe in NYC, a traumatic event that 00:25:05.420 --> 00:25:07.519 underscored how his public persona attracted 00:25:07.519 --> 00:25:10.059 violence. And his friends suffered, too. The 00:25:10.059 --> 00:25:12.759 book's notoriety meant Neal Cassidy, whose real 00:25:12.759 --> 00:25:15.380 -life antics are now public record, was easily 00:25:15.380 --> 00:25:17.960 set up and arrested for selling marijuana. Right. 00:25:18.059 --> 00:25:20.319 The freedom Kerouac wrote about in the 40s quickly 00:25:20.319 --> 00:25:22.759 turned into confinement and legal peril for those 00:25:22.759 --> 00:25:24.980 involved. So Kerouac used his earnings to retreat. 00:25:25.420 --> 00:25:28.380 Instantly. He purchased the first of three homes 00:25:28.380 --> 00:25:30.539 in Northport, New York, where he sought refuge 00:25:30.539 --> 00:25:32.960 with his mother. The man who wrote the ultimate 00:25:32.960 --> 00:25:35.519 travel narrative retreated instantly upon finding 00:25:35.519 --> 00:25:38.559 fame, seeking the quiet solitude that had birthed 00:25:38.559 --> 00:25:40.579 his earlier work. The freedom he wrote about 00:25:40.579 --> 00:25:42.619 meant constant motion. The freedom he sought 00:25:42.619 --> 00:25:44.559 meant safe domestic stability with his mother. 00:25:44.660 --> 00:25:47.740 A huge contradiction. And the later 1960s were 00:25:47.740 --> 00:25:50.119 just marked by an accelerating personal decline. 00:25:50.359 --> 00:25:52.400 Compounded by a series of devastating personal 00:25:52.400 --> 00:25:55.940 losses. Yeah, his sister died in 1964. His mother 00:25:55.940 --> 00:25:58.740 suffered a paralyzing stroke in 1966, which demanded 00:25:58.740 --> 00:26:01.119 constant care from him. And then the death of 00:26:01.119 --> 00:26:04.759 his muse, Neal Cassidy, in Mexico in 1968. That 00:26:04.759 --> 00:26:07.140 must have been a huge blow. It severed a core 00:26:07.140 --> 00:26:09.539 connection to his past. He was losing his emotional 00:26:09.539 --> 00:26:12.680 and inspirational anchors one by one. His final 00:26:12.680 --> 00:26:15.019 public appearance gives us a poignant and really 00:26:15.019 --> 00:26:17.720 painful snapshot of his state. It does. It was 00:26:17.720 --> 00:26:19.960 on William F. Buckley Jr.'s intellectual debate 00:26:19.960 --> 00:26:23.619 show Firing Line in 1968. And he appeared visibly 00:26:23.619 --> 00:26:26.700 intoxicated. Very slurring his words at times. 00:26:26.880 --> 00:26:29.559 But he used the platform to vehemently affirm 00:26:29.559 --> 00:26:32.599 his deep Catholicism and rail against the counterculture. 00:26:32.839 --> 00:26:35.519 Buckley, the quintessential conservative intellectual, 00:26:35.920 --> 00:26:38.859 seemed intrigued but also just confused by this 00:26:38.859 --> 00:26:41.180 drunken traditionalist who was simultaneously 00:26:41.180 --> 00:26:44.180 seen as the prophet of hedonism. A perfect, confusing 00:26:44.180 --> 00:26:47.400 coda to his life. It was. And Kerouac died tragically 00:26:47.400 --> 00:26:50.920 young on October 21, 1969, in St. Petersburg, 00:26:51.099 --> 00:26:53.700 Florida, at the age of 47. His health had been 00:26:53.700 --> 00:26:56.119 deteriorating dramatically due to decades of 00:26:56.119 --> 00:26:59.319 alcohol abuse. He suffered an acute esophageal 00:26:59.319 --> 00:27:02.500 hemorrhage. He was vomiting blood and was rushed 00:27:02.500 --> 00:27:05.279 to the hospital. The cause was severe cirrhosis. 00:27:05.539 --> 00:27:08.099 His liver was so damaged it couldn't produce 00:27:08.099 --> 00:27:10.660 the necessary clotting factors, and he essentially 00:27:10.660 --> 00:27:13.880 bled out. And there was also a grim contributing 00:27:13.880 --> 00:27:17.329 factor, a final. fittingly chaotic detail. Yes, 00:27:17.430 --> 00:27:19.950 an untreated hernia that he had sustained in 00:27:19.950 --> 00:27:22.269 a bar fight just weeks before his death. So a 00:27:22.269 --> 00:27:24.549 physical complication born of the disorderly 00:27:24.549 --> 00:27:26.970 life he both championed and abhorred. Exactly. 00:27:27.519 --> 00:27:30.119 He died in a state of physical distress, fulfilling, 00:27:30.539 --> 00:27:33.180 in a dark way, the prophecy he believed he had 00:27:33.180 --> 00:27:35.680 received during his first confession at age six, 00:27:35.839 --> 00:27:39.039 that he would suffer in life and die in pain 00:27:39.039 --> 00:27:41.240 and horror. Though he certainly believed in the 00:27:41.240 --> 00:27:43.900 ultimate promise of salvation. Always. He was 00:27:43.900 --> 00:27:46.160 buried back in his hometown at Edson Cemetery 00:27:46.160 --> 00:27:48.519 in Lowell, Massachusetts. At the time of his 00:27:48.519 --> 00:27:50.980 death, he was living with his third wife, Stella 00:27:50.980 --> 00:27:54.180 Sampas Kerouac. But echoing his lifelong devotion, 00:27:54.380 --> 00:27:56.880 his mother, Gabrielle, inherited the majority 00:27:56.880 --> 00:27:59.759 of his estate. And here's a massive financial 00:27:59.759 --> 00:28:02.930 contrast for you. The estate was valued at a 00:28:02.930 --> 00:28:06.869 paltry $91 at his death. $91. Reflecting his 00:28:06.869 --> 00:28:08.990 struggle to maintain any financial stability 00:28:08.990 --> 00:28:13.589 amidst the chaos. But by 1998, due to the enduring 00:28:13.589 --> 00:28:17.049 prestige of his literary legacy, that same estate 00:28:17.049 --> 00:28:21.309 was valued at $10 million. The profit died poor. 00:28:21.549 --> 00:28:25.130 The artifact became immensely valuable. But despite 00:28:25.130 --> 00:28:27.789 the tragedy of his final years, his legacy is 00:28:27.789 --> 00:28:31.509 just... Absolutely immense. It is. Kerouac's 00:28:31.509 --> 00:28:33.970 works didn't just influence literature. They 00:28:33.970 --> 00:28:35.910 fundamentally changed the rhythm and aesthetic 00:28:35.910 --> 00:28:39.390 of popular culture and 1960s rock music. The 00:28:39.390 --> 00:28:41.809 list of artists who owe a debt to his prose is 00:28:41.809 --> 00:28:44.549 remarkable. Bob Dylan, The Beatles, Patti Smith, 00:28:44.769 --> 00:28:47.049 Tom Waits, Jerry Garcia of The Grateful Dead. 00:28:47.480 --> 00:28:50.039 His spontaneous, free -flowing language provided 00:28:50.039 --> 00:28:52.500 a template for lyrical rebellion. The most direct 00:28:52.500 --> 00:28:54.380 acknowledgement, perhaps, comes from the Doors. 00:28:54.480 --> 00:28:56.819 Oh, absolutely. Keyboardist Ray Manzarek was 00:28:56.819 --> 00:28:58.960 explicit, stating that if Jack Kerouac had never 00:28:58.960 --> 00:29:00.759 written on the road, the Doors would never have 00:29:00.759 --> 00:29:03.220 existed. That's a powerful claim. It suggests 00:29:03.220 --> 00:29:06.200 Kerouac was not just an inspiration, but a structural 00:29:06.200 --> 00:29:09.509 necessity for the band's existence. And his influence 00:29:09.509 --> 00:29:13.089 transcended genres. His name is an instant cultural 00:29:13.089 --> 00:29:15.930 touchstone. It appears in songs like 10 ,000 00:29:15.930 --> 00:29:19.329 Maniacs, Hay Jack Kerouac, in tracks by the Beastie 00:29:19.329 --> 00:29:21.990 Boys, and even in modern country music. Right, 00:29:22.109 --> 00:29:24.289 Dokes Bentley mentions, Kerouac could give me 00:29:24.289 --> 00:29:27.250 a book of poems. See? His literary technique 00:29:27.250 --> 00:29:30.009 permeated the very cadence of American song. 00:29:30.230 --> 00:29:32.950 His institutional legacy also reflects his complex 00:29:32.950 --> 00:29:35.150 relationship with spirituality and poetry. It 00:29:35.150 --> 00:29:38.990 does. In 1974, Allen Ginsberg and Ann Waldman 00:29:38.990 --> 00:29:41.349 opened the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied 00:29:41.349 --> 00:29:43.910 Poetics at Naropa University, a Buddhist institution. 00:29:44.779 --> 00:29:47.619 This act canonized him not just as a novelist, 00:29:47.640 --> 00:29:50.319 but as a poet whose techniques deserved formal 00:29:50.319 --> 00:29:53.059 academic study within a spiritual context. And 00:29:53.059 --> 00:29:54.960 we find physical tributes across the country. 00:29:55.299 --> 00:29:58.059 Kerouac Park in Lowell, Jack Kerouac Alley in 00:29:58.059 --> 00:30:00.339 San Francisco's Chinatown. The house in Orlando 00:30:00.339 --> 00:30:02.339 where he wrote the Dharma Bums is now preserved 00:30:02.339 --> 00:30:04.599 as the Jack Kerouac Writers in Residence Project. 00:30:04.920 --> 00:30:07.079 In a nod to his wanderlust, even a crater on 00:30:07.079 --> 00:30:09.039 the planet Mercury was named in his honor in 00:30:09.039 --> 00:30:11.839 2015. That's amazing. But for readers today... 00:30:12.009 --> 00:30:14.009 The most valuable part of his continuing legacy 00:30:14.009 --> 00:30:17.109 are the posthumous publications that reveal the 00:30:17.109 --> 00:30:19.549 author as he truly was before the commercial 00:30:19.549 --> 00:30:21.670 pressures took hold. Absolutely. The publication 00:30:21.670 --> 00:30:25.089 of On the Road. The original scroll in 2007 was 00:30:25.089 --> 00:30:28.049 a monumental moment. It allowed readers to compare 00:30:28.049 --> 00:30:31.509 the raw, unedited, continuous flow of his initial 00:30:31.509 --> 00:30:34.190 vision, complete with the explicit content and 00:30:34.190 --> 00:30:36.589 real names, with the version that the reading 00:30:36.589 --> 00:30:38.970 public had consumed for 50 years. He showed us 00:30:38.970 --> 00:30:41.500 what pure, spontaneous prose looked like. like 00:30:41.500 --> 00:30:43.740 before the market demanded censorship and revision. 00:30:43.980 --> 00:30:45.779 And we also got the publication of his collaboration 00:30:45.779 --> 00:30:48.299 with Burroughs on the camera murder. And the 00:30:48.299 --> 00:30:50.859 hippos were boiled in their tanks in 2008, giving 00:30:50.859 --> 00:30:53.579 context to that traumatic, formative event that 00:30:53.579 --> 00:30:56.099 bonded the early beats. And finally, the 2016 00:30:56.099 --> 00:30:58.940 release of La Vie et Dommage and his French novellas 00:30:58.940 --> 00:31:02.039 Sur le Chemin and La Nuit et Ma Femme. Which 00:31:02.039 --> 00:31:04.180 confirms his unique linguistic contribution. 00:31:04.880 --> 00:31:07.859 He used spontaneous prose in French, relying 00:31:07.859 --> 00:31:10.460 on phonetics rather than standard grammar to 00:31:10.460 --> 00:31:12.700 capture the specific sound of his childhood tongue. 00:31:12.980 --> 00:31:15.660 This reinforces that his linguistic inventiveness 00:31:15.660 --> 00:31:19.119 was a deeply personal foundational drive, reaching 00:31:19.119 --> 00:31:21.200 back to his roots even as he pushed literary 00:31:21.200 --> 00:31:24.460 boundaries forward. So if we zoom out, the story 00:31:24.460 --> 00:31:26.720 of Jack Kerouac is really about the impossible 00:31:26.720 --> 00:31:29.420 tension of American genius. I think so. He was 00:31:29.420 --> 00:31:32.180 a conservative Franco -American Catholic raised 00:31:32.180 --> 00:31:34.960 on tragedy and visions of suffering who became 00:31:34.960 --> 00:31:37.779 the accidental revolutionary figure by synthesizing 00:31:37.779 --> 00:31:40.279 the rhythm of jazz and the philosophy of Buddhism. 00:31:40.539 --> 00:31:43.079 And he used spontaneous prose to try and find 00:31:43.079 --> 00:31:45.900 an immediate pure truth, yet he constantly strove 00:31:45.900 --> 00:31:48.720 for God and order amidst the chaos he created. 00:31:48.940 --> 00:31:52.140 That tension. The Catholic Puritan who gave rise 00:31:52.140 --> 00:31:54.839 to the hippie, that's the enduring image. He 00:31:54.839 --> 00:31:57.180 embodied rebellion, but his heart remained fiercely 00:31:57.180 --> 00:31:59.400 rooted in tradition. And what's fascinating here 00:31:59.400 --> 00:32:01.440 is how much of his fame rests on a technique 00:32:01.440 --> 00:32:03.940 spontaneous prose that was predicated on minimal 00:32:03.940 --> 00:32:07.059 revision and pure, raw output. Yet, as we've 00:32:07.059 --> 00:32:09.440 discussed, we know his first novel was heavily 00:32:09.440 --> 00:32:12.279 edited against his wishes, and his most famous 00:32:12.279 --> 00:32:15.059 work, The Legendary Scroll, was censored and 00:32:15.059 --> 00:32:18.039 revised for its initial publication. He aimed 00:32:18.039 --> 00:32:22.079 for pure, unedited truth, but the world accepted 00:32:22.079 --> 00:32:24.680 the polished version. Which raises an important 00:32:24.680 --> 00:32:27.319 question for you, the listener, to mull over 00:32:27.319 --> 00:32:30.079 as you navigate the road ahead. We have the artist's 00:32:30.079 --> 00:32:32.779 pure intent, the raw, continuous stream of consciousness 00:32:32.779 --> 00:32:35.619 captured on that 120 -foot scroll. And then we 00:32:35.619 --> 00:32:38.539 have the enduring artifact, the revised, published 00:32:38.539 --> 00:32:41.619 book that the public consumed and lionized. So 00:32:41.619 --> 00:32:44.019 what does this conflict between intent and artifact 00:32:44.019 --> 00:32:46.079 tell us about the true nature of creativity? 00:32:46.559 --> 00:32:48.779 Does the value of the art lie in the artist's 00:32:48.779 --> 00:32:51.400 spontaneous truth or in the enduring polished 00:32:51.400 --> 00:32:53.920 piece that the world finally accepts? Something 00:32:53.920 --> 00:32:54.420 to think about.