The Inspiration of Inspiration

Taking a break from the beatniks right now, to look into some deeper influences. After reading Waiting for Godot I noticed that existentialism and other fundamental ways of thinking/writing are often praised and criticized. Boroughs way of writing was a stream of conscious. Having to do with the meaninglessness of life and the great absurdness. Both methods are ways of allowing a person's creative spirit to reign. Jack Kerouac along with the beat generation adopted existentialist ideas with "arthouse" films which quoted and was inspired by existentialist thought and their writers. Both literary techniques have to do with obscenities in attempt to express unspoken thoughts and describe certain feelings. Two quotes I found suitable for both literary techniques are:


"The so-called Beat Generation was a whole bunch of people, of all different nationalities, who came to the conclusion that society sucked."
- Amiri Baraka



But yet, but yet, woe, woe unto those who think that the Beat Generation means crime, delinquency, immorality, amorality ... woe unto those who attack it on the grounds that they simply don’t understand history and the yearning of human souls ... woe in fact unto those who make evil movies about the Beat Generation where innocent housewives are raped by beatniks! ... woe unto those who spit on the Beat Generation, the wind’ll blow it back."
- Jack Kerouac



Although these topics may not be inspiring to others, people should know their history in order to NOT repeat it. I don't think many take a look around and actually see, they just glance over. Without many of these pioneers their would have been no push for the civil rights movement and certain freedoms that we attain today. Also the influence of drugs and their increase of popularity in the 50's-60's. Although deadly without LSD many computer programs wouldn't exist today. I'm not saying go out naked smoking the peace pipe, I'm just saying keep an open mind. What do you think JJ?

Hit the road, Jack Kerouac

( Picture of Kerouac reciting a passage of On The Road to audience)
I've recently learned that there is a Beat Museum in San Fransisco and have every intention on going there this summer when I arrive in California. Now that I've read The Dharma Bums and On The Road by Kerouac I'm moving on to a new member of the Beat Generation. Firstly, I would like to conclude on Jack Kerouac. The reason why I chose The Beat Generation as a topic for my blogs is because I'm interested in people who change the world for a drastic cause. Much like Martin Luther King was a spokesman for the Civil Rights movement, and Bob Dylan was a spokesman for the sixties, Kerouac was a spokesman for poetry and freedom of expression in the forties-fifties. People who are able to bring everyone together for a good and creative reason are admirable. Being a leader is very hard and even more so when you're leading a group of people who are against most norms. Beat was seen as worn down and weary until Kerouac and others changed the definition. Beat took on a new roll and became uplifting and rhythmic. Someone who was tired and beat out, wanted change so they went to cafes and drank black coffee staying up all night discussing eccentric topics to a certain vibe, a particular beat. Now I'm going to focus on a different member of the Beat movement. William S. Burroughs, Kerouac helped edit his book Naked Lunch which played a key role in the history of American Literature.

Japhies

As the book draws to an end there is one major and original theme that I have never learned about. Kerouac had "...a vision of a great rucksack revolution thousands or even millions of young Americans wandering around with rucksacks, going up to mountains to pray, making children laugh and old men glad, making young girls happy and old girls happier, all of 'em Zen Lunatics who go about writing poems that happen to appear in their heads for no reason and also by being kind and also by strange unexpected acts keep giving visions of eternal freedom to everybody and to all living creatures." Not only does the theme of being different show but the religion of buddhism occurs. Japhies,being spirtual bums of zen buddhism,hike and hitchhike around trying to find their truer beings. One thing I learned about Oriental Religion is that the lotus is very symbolic. The lotus flower means Estranged love, forgetful past, spiritual healing, and meditation.

Tea for Two?

On page 120 there is a brief description of tea that I found interesting. “Now you understand the Oriental passion for tea," said Japhy. "Remember that book I told you about the first sip is joy, the second is gladness, the third is serenity, the fourth is madness, the fifth is ecstasy.” Although the Beat Generation was a movement that wanted to "save the planet and alter human consciousness," Allen Ginsberg, at the same time. The achievment of those two things would be almost impossible. What other things can tea be related to? Tea itself sybolizes tranqulity and health. It also brings warmth, what other symbols in books we've read can relate to tea?

Haiku

Here is a photo I took in Cape Cod during low tide. Now one of the most memorable lines from The Dharma Bums is when Japhy and Smith are talking about how a poem puts you in the vibe so you can feel the imagery especially haiku, "A real haiku's gotta be simple as porridge and yet make you see the real thing, like the greatest haiku of them all probably is the one that goes 'The sparrow hops along the veranda, with wet feet.' by Shiki. You see the wet footprints like a vision in your mind and yet in those few words you also see all the rain that's been falling that day and almost smell the wet pine needles." (p. 59)

What kind of Haiku can you make up bringing meaning and imagery to put an impression on someone. Based on the photograph of the sunset I took, try to make up a Haiku using three metrical units of 5, 7, and 5 although Masaoka Shiki's was different.
The sparrow hops

Along the verandah,

With wet feet. -Shiki

"the living and the dying and the heartbreak"

In The Dharma Bums by Kerouac the main characters are narrator Ray Smith (Kerouac) and Japhy Ryder (Gary Snyder). So far themes such as outdoor gatherings to release the spirit, hitchhiking and hiking, jazz clubs, poetry readings, and parties with Buddhist rituals have appeared. The main idea of the book is the feeling of conforming in this world, to look and act a certain way. On page 29 Smith says, "I felt like lying down by the side of the trail and remembering it all. The woods do that to you, they always look familiar, long lost, like the face of a long-dead relative, like an old dream, like a piece of forgotten song drifting across the water, most of all like golden eternities of past childhood or past manhood and all the living and the dying and the heartbreak that went on a million years ago and the clouds as they pass overhead seem to testify by their own lonesome familiarity to this feeling." The woods make Smith feel a certain way, do you think many people would feel the same? Can you relate to his longing of the woods and what they represent or to something that may make you feel this longing towards something else? Keep in mind that it's a "lonesome familiarity" that Kerouac is describing Smith's thoughts as.

The Dharma Bums

Much like On The Road, Jack Kerouac's The Dharma Bums was written years after in 1958and attains similar themes. Including The wilderness, travel, city life, drugs and alcohol, love, and purpose of life. Kerouac seems more mature and interested in Zen Buddhism. What is interesting about this novel compared to Kerouac's other novels is that it seems to relate to all his other semi-fictional works. Dharma is a noun meaning "essential quality or character, as of the cosmos or one's own nature and conformity to religious law, custom, duty, or one's own quality or character." I predict that the definition of dharma will have a lot to do with the storyline. The picture is of North Cascades National Park where the book takes place.