Jack Kerouac: Selected Letters: Volume 2 [Hardcover]

Jack Kerouac (Author), Ann Charters (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 1999

When Viking published the first volume of Jack Kerouac's letters in 1995, it was considered a major addition to Kerouac scholarship. The early correspondence portended the uninhibited and spontaneous prose style that would later become the author's trademark. In the second and final volume of this life-in-letters, Ann Charters, renowned Kerouac biographer and editor of The Portable Jack Kerouac, features selected letters that illuminate the latter years of this inimitable writer--the years of fame, alcohol, and disillusionment.

Written between 1957, the year of the publication of On the Road, and two days before his death in 1969 at the age of forty-seven, Kerouac's letters tell his own story through his candid and voluminous correspondence to friends and confidants--from Malcolm Cowley, Allen Ginsberg, and Gary Snyder to Joyce Johnson, John Clellon Holmes and Sterling Lord. In his letters, Kerouac explores his development as a writer, as well as revealing how the onslaught of publicity and criticism after the publication of On the Road in 1957 nearly destroyed him. Offering unparalleled insights into the mind and life of a giant of the American literary landscape, Jack Kerouac: Selected Letters 1957-1969 is a major addition to the understanding of the artist and his work.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The peripatetic urgency, Buddhist catchphrases and casual prose of On the Road (1957) and Dharma Bums (1958) made Jack Kerouac (1922-1969) the star of the Beat generation. Kerouac's "craft of spontaneous prose" (in Charters's words) let him use his letters as rough drafts for some of his autobiographical fiction. Devotees of those novels can troll for their favorite episodes among Kerouac's complaints, requests, loans, repayments, reports, retorts, rebukes and resolutions. "[W]hen I write a book it's just a chapter in the whole story," a 1960 missive to Neal Cassady explains, "but there wd be no literature in the world safe to say i would rather read than my own remembrance of things." Editor Charters (also Kerouac's biographer) uses her annotations and commentary to make the sometimes hasty, expressive missives cohere as an account of the novelist's life. A first volume of letters appeared in 1995; this second starts with the publication of On the Road and continues almost to the day Kerouac died. The years 1957-1960, the height of Kerouac's career, occupy more than half the volume. Later letters record his struggle to care for his ailing mother, his efforts to finish his later books and his troubles with money and health: "I drink more than ever, my hands tremble, I can't type." Frequent addressees and subjects include Gary Snyder, Philip Whalen, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg ("I still think he's a false prophet, sheep's clothing and ravening wolf"). By turns witty, slovenly and empathetic, the letters provide a look into Kerouac's psyche and into the exhilarating, frustrating, ramshackle milieu he helped create. (Nov.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"Charters's carefully selected letters shed a revealing light on this self-analysis and his attempts to capture 'the objective beautiful sad ungraspable world as it is.' For Jack Kerouac's eternal admirers, the beat goes on." -- Memphis Commercial Appeal, January 9, 2000

"Selected Letters presents the bare, bleeding bones of jack undergoing his final tribulations... ." -- Valley Advocate, December 9, 1999

...moments of frank self-inquiry are rare, and gradually the reason becomes clear: menace and doubt confronted Kerouac whichever way he looked. -- The New York Times Book Review, James Campbell

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 544 pages
• Publisher: Viking Adult (November 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670861901
• ISBN-13: 978-0670861903
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.5 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,341,504 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Kerouac - Selected Letters Review, January 6, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Jack Kerouac: Selected Letters: Volume 2 (Hardcover)

Good book. I knew that Jack had his problems later in his life but this book really shows that he got off track in the late 50's rather than the 60's. This book reads real fast in that you can't put it down. It reveals the relationships that Jack had with the other Beat Poets among other people. I recommend this book to all interested in Kerouac and the Beat Generation.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Literary Document of Great Worth, September 3, 2008

By 

C. Middleton (Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Jack Kerouac: Selected Letters, 1957-1969 (Paperback)

For any biographer or historian the original letters of the subject is a valuable and extremely important source of information in order to gain insight into the time period, and/or the person under study.

In part 2 of Kerouac's Selected Letters, the text truly gives the student or curious, a penetrating look into this enigmatic and ultimately tragic American author. For many, Jack Krerouac represents an important shift in American literature but also a significant historical (literary) mark of an entire generation. Ann Charters, (Kerouac's first biographer) editor of this volume, has done a pain-staking and beautiful job with this book - we come to know him as a man, the artist and his concerns; generosity, relationships; his struggle with the demon drink and, most importantly, the development of his unique prose style, leading to his now iconic status.

The letters begin in the year (1957) when "On the Road" was published. At this stage of Kerouac's life, from the tone and content of his letters, he is excited, finishing incomplete manuscripts, organizing "get- togethers', writing his publisher and working on new projects. As the years progress, sadly, his drinking accelerates, he becomes more and more misanthropic and, in the end, paranoid. It is true - it was the booze that killed his body but it was fame as an author that murdered his soul. More than likely, it was both.

Ann Charters suggests that these letters were experiments in style and possible new ideas for future projects, his friends perhaps 'sounding boards' where the reader can see his development of what is famously known as "spontaneous prose".

Kerouac was also a prolific poet. Some call his "novel", Mexico City Blues, one long, epic poem. This particular book, for me, was difficult to read, until viewing the piece as poetry - it was then the penny dropped and the book became much easier to read.

An example of a little poem written for Stella Sampas to Gary Snyder from Japan:

"A poem to Stella Sampas?"

"After the shower,
Among the drenched roses,
The bird thrashing in the bath

After the shower,
my cat meowing
On the porch"

It has always been my opinion that Jack's poetry is underrated, but that's neither here nor there.

Kerouac wanted his letters to be published thus he kept copies in neat files by year.

Anyone interested in American literature, pursuing a research project or wanting greater insight into the man, these letters are an invaluble historical document revealing the inner workings of the "Beat Generation" that continues to affect most modern writing to present time.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Highly recommended for all Jack Kerouac fans!, March 3, 2000

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jack Kerouac: Selected Letters: Volume 2 (Hardcover)

An excellent survey of the writer Jack Kerouac and recommended picks for any collection strong in Kerouac presentations. Ann Charters edits Jack Kerouac: Selected Letters 1957-1969 presenting his late letters. her first volume contributed to a new understanding of Kerouac and his work: this volume also includes the same attention to notes and detail, furthering her goal of presenting his life via his writings.