I’m still slogging my way through this, wondering why in hell these guys are doing such dumb things, then I remember.
I do of course remember this prelude to my own youth, but these yearnings for a better world in this particular generation was a more selfish one. Freedom to be an individual, rather than any altruistic need to change the world. These folk merely changed themselves within the situation.
I’m also not completely taken with Kerouac’s writing–an occasional pearl necklace of words strung together in a sentence, or a paragraph of insight. But the structure is fairly basic–except in its adherence to the elements of story–and there is no real conflict that draws my empathy, my interest in the characters.
Rather unprofessionally put, I feel it’s a story of traipsing around the country sponging off friends.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology
“Rather unprofessionally put, I feel it’s a story of traipsing around the country sponging off friends.”..LOLOL..Goodness, the soda pop i’m drinking went straight to my nose! 🙂 I concur! Funny, I was stalking GG Marquez on google and landed here. Nothing like Kansas..I’m sure I’ll return. Peace and Joy to you ~Trish
Oh Trish, I’ve got loads of posts on GGM’s Love in the Time of Cholera and more on 100 Years. He’s one of my favs, near McCarthy and Steinbeck and Faulkner. Likely the easiest way to find them if you’re interested is to go my “Literature” Categories in the list to the right, and scroll back through the past year or so.
Glad I’ve got someone in agreement with me on Kerouac. Maybe it was ripe for the times?
What are your feelings on the art/science of soap opera plotting? I seem to be in a “General Hospital” gully lately, and it’s quite fascinating. A particular story style, because there is no pure dramatic arc.
Actually Mark,the plotting is the main element in soap operas. (I watched GH for years and years, many years ago.)
The story arcs are there, dragged out through a month or two and they are multi-layered almost as if there are a half dozen stories going on at once, with only the environment to tie them together. Though of course, the characters do know each other so the transition between one dramatic storyline to the next is often made by dialogue to fill in and lead to the separate events. Fade in and out does it too, depending upon the viewer’s dedication to pick up the thread. As far as characterization, I think they depend heavily on visuals: camera panning into that horrorstruck look, words left unsaid on the lips, tears in the eyes.