Trip Trap [Paperback]

Jack Kerouac (Author), Albert Saijo (Author), Lew Welch (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2001

This newly-revised edition-originally published in 1973-of the haiku Jack Kerouac, Albert Saijo, and Lew Welch jotted down on the road from San Francisco to New York in 1959, are dense, earthy incarnations of life on the road: "A coral colored Cadillac/ in Texas/ Threw gravel all over us,/ our beat jeep/ -Our windshield is nicked/ but our eyes/ are/ CLEAR..." Albert recounts their November trip in Lew's Jeepster, making the big city scene, visiting Jack's home in Northport on Long Island, and the long drive back west. The book also includes letters to Kerouac from Lew Welch in Reno.

Product Details

• Paperback: 69 pages
• Publisher: Grey Fox Press (January 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0912516046
• ISBN-13: 978-0912516042
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,318,143 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #20 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Literature & Fiction > Poetry > Japanese & Haiku

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Three voices, one volume, July 2, 2003

By 

Michael J. Mazza - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Trip Trap (Paperback)

"Trip Trap: Haiku on the Road" represents a collaborative effort by Jack Kerouac, Albert Saijo, and Lew Welch. There is also an editor's note by Donald Allen. The book is divided into 4 main sections. "A Recollection," by Saijo, is an 11 page memoir of the road trip during which the poems in the book were written. "We Started for New York," also about the trip, is the opening of an unfinished novel by Welch. The main text, "Trip Trap," is a body of poetry attributed to all three as a collaborative effort. And finally, "Dear Jack" is a collection of letters (dated 1959-60) from Welch to Kerouac.

"Trip Trap" is thus, despite its short length (69 + vii pages), a diverse text with a fascinating history behind it. The poems are not haiku in the strictest sense; I would call them "haiku-like." The poems offer some interesting imagery and reflections on the American landscape, as well as a number of literary references. We get many glimpses from the men's journey--radio antennas in Texas, cows in Nebraska, a cross on an Arizona highway, etc. A particularly interesting section involves a Saijo haiku with alternate versions by Welch and Kerouac.

The book overall is infused with the sense of discovery one gets in traveling across the USA. Saijo notes that the poetry in the book "has the fathomless art of random speech overheard through the course of a day." I really enjoyed "Trip Trap."

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars It pays to be talented and famous, November 1, 2000

By 

M. J. Smith (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Trip Trap (Paperback)

Such "haiku" - "They make good coffee / in Oklahoma" - not particularly haiku, not particularly interesting ... if I wrote the lines, they certainly wouldn't be published ... there are other similarly brilliant entries: "There's Mister I-Cower- / under-My Car" or brilliant stand-alone lines "Whore candy". Trip Trap leaves me unimpressed.

However, the book contains a recollection of the trip by Albert Saijo, the trip as described in an unfinished work of Lew Welch, Trip Trap itself which is a collaborative effort between those two and Jack Kerouac, and finally some letters of Lew Welch to Jack Kerouac. The net result is a book that gives insight into the beat movement and into the minds of Kerouac and Welch. For those with even a slight interest in either topic, this is an interesting and informative book.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars One To Avoid Unless You're A Real Fan, March 14, 2002

By 

M. Hori "Jesse Glass" (Urayasu, Chiba Japan) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Trip Trap (Paperback)

Lew Welch and Jack Kerouac...two of my favorite writers on the road with Albert Saijo (who turns out to be a fine memoirist) right after Kerouac's roaring success with On The Road. There they are madly yapping away in front seat and back of Lew's jeepster Willy, rushing through the nights and days of innocent (well, really not so) America, and stopping once in a while to record it all in haiku. It's got to be a classic, right? Think again. Sure there are one or two good haiku to be found in the collection, and Grey Wolf Press includes enough supporting material to add context and some pith to the purchase, but this book is really for the die-hard Gotta-Have-It-All-Right-Down-To-The-Laundry-Lists-fans of beatdom. Ring of Bone, On The Road, and just about every other book written by these greats will give you more for your money.