Essays on On The Road

Author Jack Kerouac once said, “My fault, my failure, is not in the passions I have, but in my lack of control of them.” Kerouac believed his fate consisted of much more than bad luck and poor decision making and attributed it to the naturally...

Technology has become a big part in today’s society, which has led to more and more people giving their attention to a cell phone rather than the road. Texting while driving caused severe injuries in over 330,000 car accidents. Even though technology is everywhere, it...

One of the first American ideals was that of the rugged individualist: the explorer-hero, in the tradition of Lewis and Clark and Davy Crockett, as well as the cowboy. America, especially the western part, was a new, exciting frontier yearning to be explored. However, once...

The character of Sal Paradise, in Jack Kerouac’s novel On the Road, is a complex fusion of the fictional and the real. Kerouac created Sal in his own image and used him as a tool to shine light on the state of America in the...

Jack Kerouac’s novel On the Road is a hallmark story of the Beat Generation, a movement defined by its rejection of conformity in favor of a search for deeper meaning. It is this search that serves as a catalyst for the majority of the action...

Jack Kerouac’s novel On the Road follows Sal Paradise on journeys through America. Sal spends most of his time traveling by foot or car; however, the novel focuses on his time spent in three American cities: New York City, Denver, and San Francisco. Kerouac elaborates...

In Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, the introduction of Dean Moriarty and the paradoxical themes of the Eastern and Western “road” to the character Sal Paradise incur dissension in Sal’s evolution. Sal ultimately chooses to return to the East and its standard of living, establishing...