just enough pathos

Dean Moriarty: The New “Hero” of the Road.

On the Road (1957), known as the “Bible of the Beat Generation” is most definitely Kerouac’s most popular novel. Characterised by rapid pace, this book vividly portrays 1950’s underground America. Kerouac, the “King of the Beats”, had heard the term ‘beat’, on the streets. According to Kerouac, it meant “weariness with all the forms”, - weariness with militarism, its conformity, distrust of spontaneity and nature, and excess faith in human reason and technological process. The Beats championed all forms of liberation- sexual and spiritual and they glorified and celebrated candour, individuality, risk and were completely opposed to materialism and the mass media.  What seemed to set the Beats apart from their peers was a deep, disturbing alienation that transcended their identities as artists and extended to personal idiosyncrasy and a self-destructive bent. Such tendencies were captured in an intellectual fascination perhaps even an identification with outcasts and criminals. The Beat agenda attempted to reveal in the most intimate detail, the world of the outcast. America, to the Beats, had morphed into a ‘spiritual wasteland’, a land of intolerable repression and conformity, and extreme measures were needed to overcome the restrictions placed on the individual. They sought liberation through hedonistic self-indulgence and found companionship and spiritual kinship with those on the margins of the society- addicts, thieves and dropouts. ‘On the Road’, like Ginsberg’s ‘Howl’ and the novels of Burroughs, chronicles the life of the new hero- the marginal individual, who leads a dangerous life and who attacks every notion of normality embraced by the bland guardians of middle class existence. Kerouac explores through Dean Moriarty the nature of the ‘anti-hero’, the ‘hipster’, the ‘non-conformist street punk’ and the rebel outcast.

Dean Moriarty- “the holy con man with the shining mind” is the subject of the novel. He is variously described as “A holy primitive”, a “mad man” “a youth tremendously excited with life” Dean stands for Neal Cassady, Kerouac’s friend and someone who stood for the values which according to Kerouac constituted the word ‘beat’. Dean/Neal had spent their childhood in Denver slums, and had been a part of reform schools and jails. He is a social outcast- yet he is exuberant, spontaneous and in him can be located a tremendous optimism which in a way transcends the existential uncertainty of the era. Sal Paradise is the narrator of ‘On the Road’- someone who identifies with the ‘hero on action’, but is himself not at the centre of activity. He is inspired to a great extent by Dean and attempts to bring about a change in his own life. Through the continental road trips, Dean and Sal are looking for means to partake in the American experience and to discover “IT”- “a transcendental moment in which the complete essence of something is understood”.

The structure of ‘On the Road’ is neatly arranged and the order of events roughly corresponds to similar events in Kerouac’s life. The narrative begins when Sal Paradise (Kerouac) meets Dean Moriarty (Neal Cassady) for the first time around 1946 in New York City and ends shortly after Sal gets back to New York after a devastating trip to Mexico City with Dean in October, 1950. Sal first met Dean after he got divorced and he describes how, with the arrival of Dean “began the part of my life you could call my life on the road” The novel is centred only on this life. The coming of Dean is a major turning point in the narrator’s life, and as the novel ends four years later with Sal’s separation from Dean, another major turning point takes place. However, there is no hint of what happens in the future. 

The narrator Sal is essentially different from the excitable Dean. Dean Moriarty is almost manically energetic, and he embodies a kind of freedom that can never be achieved by Sal. Sal Paradise’s character in the novel is important- he is deliberately presented sketchily so as to set off the two. He is presented as a follower, the “innocent neophyte”, someone who “shambles” after people who interest him- the “mad” people- “ the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles..” And needless to say, Dean is one of the “mad ones” and Sal is overwhelmed with a sense of wonder at Dean’s holy primitiveness. Though he cannot himself experience fully what Dean is experiencing, he is tempted to, he is keen to observe and identify with someone who is an archetype of the naturally transformed new man. Through Dean, Sal is shown the folly of rationalistic and materialistic impulses that reflect the dominant culture in favour of a more instinctive spiritual orientation. It is only but natural that Sal admires Dean as the latter possesses the “special knowledge”, and Sal is almost envious of this knowledge. Dean is the hipster who is free from and far away from conventions and he has been able to preserve the spontaneity, the vital primitive response and he has the courage to embrace life on the edge and yet survive. Like Sal, Dean doesn’t reflect on experience and record it, and unlike him, he doesn’t at any point in the novel, face any kind of spiritual impasse. Sal, at the point of achieving near transcendence, falls sick and Dean deserts his friend in search of more life. When Sal recovers, he realises “what a rat” Dean had been, yet he does not discredit Dean’s heroic status. The negative qualities of Dean are alluded to from time to time in the novel but they are usually dismissed in favour of a positive portrayal. What is clear from this is that Kerouac’s attempt to present Dean as the “religious prophet”, “an avatar of pure being”, and a new kind of anti hero obscured Dean’s demonic side and resulted in the narrator’s unwillingness to gauge his “megalomania”. It is evident in the novel that Dean is manipulative, yet Sal defends him as being misunderstood, or accuses others as being envious of him. The connection between Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty has often been interpreted in homosexual terms, but Sal emphasises throughout the novel his quest for a figure of a brother, rather than a lover. Later in the novel Sal explains matter-of-factly to two college boys terrified by Dean’s wild driving- “He’s mad...and yes, he’s my brother.”

Dean Moriarty is someone who is fully possessed by the idea of reaching the zenith of physical and emotional delight. He is someone who seduces- one feels almost tempted to follow in his footsteps. Sal is hypnotized by Dean and lured by the idea of experiencing a “new world”, but he gradually begins to understand that he is inherently different from Dean. After each road-trip, each marvellous adventure, Sal retires to a protected environment- living at home, being cared for by an aunt, and working on a novel. Sal has been on the road, but he has never really been of the road, like Dean.

It is important to mention that it is during Kerouac’s fateful trip to the Mexico City with Cassady that he discovered Cassady’s nature fully- Cassady for Kerouac had then become “more than an embodiment of beat”- he had become the “embodiment of the spiritual forces of creation and destruction”. Cassady fascinated Kerouac, as Dean fascinates Sal Paradise. Dean is presented as a glorified figure in the novel and his “hipster amorality” which was the source of Holmes’s and Brossard’s uneasiness with the “hipster” figure, is overlooked. Sal, in Part 3 of “On the Road” assumes responsibility for Dean’s eccentric behavior and herein occurs the climax of their relationship.

Sal Paradise’s major illumination in the novel is his ability to recognize “IT”. Dean illustrates this concept by referring to the jazz musicians they had seen one night- “Now, man, that alto man last night had IT- he held it once he found it, I’ve never seen a guy who could hold it so long.” The quest for “IT” continues in Part 4 of the novel and eventually Sal realises the true nature of “IT”. “IT” is ecstasy which eventually leads to death and loss. This idea of immense joy and purity which consequently leads to a great sense of loss, disillusionment and dismay reminds one of Nick Carroway’s final attitude towards Gatsby’s dream in ‘The Great Gatsby’. 

It is quite clear that “On the Road” finally is a defeatist and even an “elegiac” novel- it is truly “enormously sad”. Despite the tremendous excitement which characterizes the novel, it promises nothing but disillusionment. Sal Paradise, at the end of the road, has discovered his hero and the dreams this hero represented and he is back to the world he belonged to. Kerouac’s ‘spontaneous prose style’ is completely new, but the novel remains a traditional tale of youth’s disillusionment. However, what stands out is how this disenchantment is transferred here to the ‘hobo’- the bohemian living on the margins of the society, embodied through Dean Moriarty. Through Dean, Kerouac not only celebrates the figure of the outcast, but also upholds the ‘spontaneous American personality’, and the effort of that personality to express himself through “confessional conversations, cars, sex, marijuana and jazz.” ‘On the Road’ turned Dean into a human image of the “vast wild continent which is his playground”. This celebration of life by Dean is irresistible and consequently, ‘On the Road’ continues to inspire the young to follow in Dean’s footsteps and to feel, as they are doing so, that they are taking part in some unwritten ritual of the American experience.

my favourite term paper. reminiscing. hence. might delete soon. but wanted you people to read. =) appreciation or brickbats welcome, but please don't steal.