Customer Reviews

Book of Dreams

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Don't be fooled. This is not Kerouac's plans, visions or hopes. These are no less than his actual unexpurgated nightly dreams written in classic Kerouac prose. His style flourishes in what you might label short fictions of the night. Long rambling structures uninhibited by standard literary conventions, Book of dreams could in fact be one of his purest works. Perfect for his long `stream of consciousness' writing that Kerouac adopted early to mid in his career, his dreams change from scene to disconnected scene filled with all the characters of his semi autobiographical works stretching from Carlo Marx & Cody right back to GJ & Scotty of his days in Doctor Sax. He also meets along the way W.C fields & someone who might be Marlene Dietrich! The uninhibited retelling of his dreams is often hilarious, sometimes raw, exposing Jacks vulnerabilities & always highly interesting. If there is any criticism I have, it is only that due to the nature of dreams, it is difficult at times to keep your focus on them, (I lost my bookmark half way through & couldn't remember what I had read!) so fluid & morphing are these dream experiences he writes about. Above all though, it is a chance to get `into his head' & find out a little more about Kerouac, however you find that his dreams & his life as lived vicariously through his books were not all that different. Book of dreams wouldn't have been half as fun had I not been acquainted with the collection of books that make up the Dolouz legend; therefore as a first Kerouac book I'd recommend reading something else, but a must for anybody who loves his work.

I read aloud in one sitting the BOLD beginnings of every dream in the book and felt it was almost impossible to turn the reading experience into an educational experience. It was entertaining and got my mind flowing, but I did not remember any of the dreams. It was just hoards of scrambledy written dreams about bizarre personal experiences in Kerouac's life, written with incongruous images and carry ons (as Kerouac often does and this review does) and it is a hard to follow book. It did make me try the same experiment in taking down my dreams, but I was jealous I could not take my dreams down as vividly with as much creativity as Jack did. It is poetic and I like that the subjects of each beginning of the dreams are different and it seems he must have embellished some of his dream chronicles. Uhmm, the writing again shows Kerouac had a great sense of humor about the reality that readers would probably not make it through many of the details of the book.

Book Of Dreams is Jack Kerouac's written record of his dream life, a kind of parallel autobiography of his soul. A writer whose novels, beginning with On The Road, spoke for and to a whole generation of young men and women, Jack Kerouac was a man who, awake or asleep, struggled with the problems that beset all human relationships, and that makes his writings (and his dreams) as meaningful and compelling today as they were half a century ago. This new and expanded City Lights addition is the first full publication of the complete manuscript as Jack Kerouac intended it to be. The unabridged edition of Kerouac's Book Of Dreams is an essential addition for academic collections, and "must" reading for all Jack Kerouac fans and enthusiasts.

You really have to read all of his other books, then get this one, to fully appreciate his subconcious dreamworld. I re-read this one every couple years...LOVE IT.