Friday, April 30, 2010
No future no past (an observation)
What we know from Jacks past is very limited. He was married, his dad died and he is from North Carolina. But Jack doesn't live in the past or at least he never writes about it. Jack lives in the moment. His past is almost nonexistent. Most authors I have read go off on anecdotes of their child hood or what happened the previous week but Jack never does things like that. Sometimes Jack will discuss things in his future like where he will travel next, but he mainly stays in the present. We never really know what is going to happen next and we don't really know what happened. The story just continues on, and on, and on...
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3 comments:
It almost seem inhumanly to do so. As people we often more or less, depending on the person, reflect in the past. With this book you find no reflection, which is refreshing but you start to wonder is he just running away from something? Is the book, or writing it, the run away ticket? Jack probably does reflect while writing this book and while traveling of course, but there's a reason why he doesn't want us, the readers, to see the past. Do he not want us to focus on it? Is he ashamed? Can he not handle it himself? Or is he simply one of those people who truly lives there lives moving forward with only the slightest bit of reflection to keep themselves aware? I think not.
I think that not knowing his past makes the book better. I don't want to know Jack on a personal level. I like how we are only seeing one side of him. I feel as though I would judge him more if I knew more of his past, but because I don't I can foucs more on what he is doing and what he is talking about.
I am kind of interested in the differences between the way he portrays his backround/childhood in the book vs. the way he really is. A few years ago I read a biography of him and it said his family was French Canadian, and so he always felt like an outcast. Also he was from Massachussetts, I think? The book Visions of Cody (also by Kerouac), his childhood is portrayed very vividly, and so it is intriguing to see the differences he chose.
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