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    On the Road: 50th Anniversary Edition
    Unavailable
    On the Road: 50th Anniversary Edition
    Unavailable
    On the Road: 50th Anniversary Edition
    Audiobook11 hours

    On the Road: 50th Anniversary Edition

    Written by Jack Kerouac

    Narrated by Will Patton

    3.5/5

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    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    A 50th anniversary hardcover edition of Kerouac's classic novel that defined a generation

    Few novels have had as profound an impact on American culture as On the Road. Pulsating with the rhythms of 1950s underground America, jazz, sex, illicit drugs, and the mystery and promise of the open road, Kerouac's classic novel of freedom and longing defined what it meant to be "beat" and has inspired generations of writers, musicians, artists, poets, and seekers who cite their discovery of the book as the event that "set them free." Based on Kerouac's adventures with Neal Cassady, On the Road tells the story of two friends whose four cross-country road trips are a quest for meaning and true experience. Written with a mixture of sad-eyed naïveté and wild abandon, and imbued with Kerouac's love of America, his compassion for humanity, and his sense of language as jazz, On the Road is the quintessential American vision of freedom and hope, a book that changed American literature and changed anyone who has ever picked it up. This hardcover edition commemorates the fiftieth anniversary of the first publication of the novel in 1957 and will be a must-have for any literature lover.





    From the Hardcover edition.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateOct 18, 2007
    ISBN9781429592406
    Unavailable
    On the Road: 50th Anniversary Edition
    Author

    Jack Kerouac

    Jack Kerouac (1922-1969) es el novelista más destacado y emblemático de la Generación Beat. En Anagrama se han publicado sus obras fundamentales: En el camino, Los subterráneos, Los Vagabundos del Dharma, La vanidad de los Duluoz y En la carretera. El rollo mecanografiado original, además de Cartas, la selección de su correspondencia con Allen Ginsberg, y, con William S. Burroughs, Y los hipopótamos se cocieron en sus tanques.

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    Reviews for On the Road

    3.5/5

    6,320 ratings180 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Love, love, love this book. And pretty much everything else Kerouac touched.
    • 2/5
      This is a book I read because I "needed to know." For all the hype surrounding Kerouac, I thought it was a real let-down. In its day I'm sure it was ground-breaking, but I didn't much care for it.
    • 3/5
      There are some marvellously well-written passages in this, and I enjoyed it, but in terms of plot this is a book where lots goes on without much really happening. I also found the key character of Dean quite unlikable, and found it difficult to believe someone as eloquent as the narrator would be such good friends with him.Overall this book didn't have the impact on me that it seems to have had on so many people. Perhaps I am the wrong age, or from the wrong age.
    • 1/5
      Too boring to finish ...
    • 1/5
      I hated this book
    • 5/5
      My rite of passage.
    • 3/5
      Some good prose and very good descriptions. I didn't like the characters and how they treated other people and women were portrayed as something to use and discard. Some parts of the book were so manic they exhausted me. I've heard this is a classic because it was the first "stream of conscientious" novel. Whatever.
    • 4/5
      This book was a well-written, interesting narrative about people I would absolutely hate and despise.
    • 3/5
      I think that this would have been a much better read had I read it at a different point in my life.

      Had I read this book when I was on the cusp of adulthood, cynical to the world, and eager to see what the world had to offer me, this would have left a much better taste in my mouth. Instead, I'm a little older, a little wiser, and not so much into the silly, crazy shenanigans that sales and friends find themselves throughout the many escapades while On the Road.

      I think another reason why I may not have enjoyed it as much as others who have praised it as the great American novel is because I simply read it too fast. I think that to enjoy it for what it was really worth, a slower pace of reading with many days to let the plot simmer in my brain would have allowed for a better appreciation of the story. Alas, as soon as I read the first few chapters and realized that this was not for me, I sped read through the entire thing in a manner of days.

      For all my complaints, there were a few memorable scenes. The imagery of the waving figure on the horizon as one drives away comes to mind. Not to mention the angel devil on wheels, as evoked by the character of Dean.

      An okay novel for those that want to relive their bohemian days on the road.
    • 3/5
      I went in expecting not to like this. My cursory knowledge of the beat generation icons led me to believe they were all pretentious assholes, which definitely seems to be true. What I forgot is that a pretentious asshole can still write a decent book, and that a book doesn't have to be about good or likable people to be engrossing.

      Kerouac paints a vivid picture of an America so far removed from me in time that it might as well be a different country. The book is somewhat worth reading for that alone. Beyond that, though, is a remarkably compelling first-person narrator. There's just something about the voice of it that draws you in. A madness, if you will. A lust for life, an insane hedonism, a massively conflated sense of self-importance.

      Speaking of madness, Kerouac, apparently, wrote this on a single sheet of paper (he taped them together so he wouldn't have to stop typing) over three weeks while being kept up by coffee, cigarettes, and drugs. He cut and added things here and there after that, but essentially we're reading the result of a three-week outpouring of work based on the extensive notes he took during the journey. It shows. The writing is still rough. Sentences go on for too long and obviously should have been cut into two distinct sentences. Existential tangents blindside you constantly. A lack of focus permeates the whole thing. On the whole I don't mean any of it in a bad way, necessarily. It is, I think, an intrinsic part of the appeal. If this same book had been written in a more "put together" way, I would count it as an overall loss. It's raw, ephemeral, like it came from some otherworldly force instead of human hands. It definitely fits his character, at the very least.

      Still, there are major problems. Mostly in pacing and any sort of consistent quality. The beginning and end of the book contains solid four star material, and there are similar gems lurking in the middle as well--but there are also some long bits that are two stars at best. I feel like 3/5 is a fair average of my experience, but it was by no means consistently that good the entire way through. Just keep that in mind. You will hit parts that drag and they drag hard.
    • 5/5
      Kerouac represents the next evolution in American twentieth-century literature in my view. I am also curious about the fascination with the Dharma at Big Sur and the Great Divide exemplified by the music of my most favourite composer, John Adams, and the appearance of these themes in Jack Kerouac's work. The continental fascination in Adams' work is clearly explored in On the Road. The Beat Age is clearly the mid-life crisis of Fitzgerald's Jazz Age which evolves into the hippy era in old age. Kerouac captures this beautifully and I can only imagine the reception the novel received in the 1950s. Kerouac is so obviously lining himself up with Hemingway that it is not only obvious but overt. I suspect Steinbeck's influence is somewhat more covert. Yet Kerouac's influence on popular culture is more than obvious and readers can expect to notice parts of On the Road that appear unoriginal, yet this is obviously the original source for the nuances that are so prolific today. I felt a tinge of sadness as I approached the end of the book, almost as if I wished the road would keep going forever. In many ways, I suspect this was Kerouac's point. Definitely one of my favourite reads and I am now exploring Cormac McCarthy's The Road to keep the theme going. Keoruac certainly makes we want to go on a road trip sooner rather than later. If only I could drive the Cadillacs and Plymouths and Fords of that era!
    • 2/5
      Boring. It does nothing to increase my view of the world or expose humanity in any way. Maybe because I grew up with my father and uncles telling these exact same stories, but this did absolutely nothing for me.
    • 4/5
      A very impressive accomplishment but didn't really do much for me.
    • 5/5
      I deemed this my favorite novel at one time.
    • 3/5
      Over-rated ramblings of self-puffery and female objectification.
    • 3/5
      The writing is of a high standard in this book, but the story is a meandering and rather repetitive account of encounters with eccentrics and women, mostly while drunk and/or high. It reminded me a bit of the film "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" - lots of pleasures along the way, but a slightly unsatisfying whole.
    • 4/5
      a necessary read.
    • 1/5
      Not my cup of tea
    • 3/5
      I read other people's reviews and either people love, love, love this book or hate it. I'm somewhere in between. An interesting look into these characters lives at a time when the world was changing and emerging from the last war and into the late 40s and a sense of optimism and anything is possible, set against a background of people struggling to live. Hobo's taking flatcars across the country to look for work. Not sure I would see the movie, but maybe when it gets to dvd. 3 stars.
    • 2/5
      This book proved to be one of the most painful reads ever. I kept reading other books which slowed the process even further. But i definitely feel proud that i have finished it. Apart from this, the characters are not likeable at all. They are silly and egoistical. The book also happens to be quite sexist and racist, then again it was the 50s but it proved to be another major turn off for me,nevertheless. I don't recommend it to anyone, a seriously overrated 'classic'.
    • 2/5
      Painful reading experience! Don't care anyone in the book. The life described in the book fits people's wild and rebelling dream in the old days. However, today we also need some positive energy which is lack of obviously in this book.
    • 3/5
      Kerouac misspelled Thelonious in this novel. Page 228: "..and meeting mad Thelonius [sic.] Monk."

      This bothers me. And it bothers me that no one bothered to fix it, especially in this "Great Book of the 20th Century" edition. Kerouac also references a non-existent drummer named Max West (p.208) in the context of Dizzy. Pretty sure he meant Max Roach.

      And finally on page 155 there's this: "Fort Lowell Road, out where Hingham lived, would [sic.] along lovely riverbed trees in the flat desert."

      I think that was supposed to be "wound along lovely..."

      Copy editors?
    • 1/5
      Don't get me wrong, I can do books that have zero plot, hence why I love Salinger, but this is just terrible. Seriously, how can anyone love this? I won't be reading it again, thats for sure.
    • 3/5
      This was a revolutionary book and it is remarkable that this autobiographical story takes place almost immediately after WW II. Then it must have been truly revolutionary. Now, the characters just seem like opportunistic misogynistic asshats.
    • 3/5
      I found this a bit of a let-down. The early stages were enjoyable, but it seemed to degenerate into a series of meaningless trips, and I found Dean quite tiresome. The trip to Mexico, late on, was interesting, but overall I was just a bit disappointed given the book's reputation.
    • 2/5
      On the Road is a loved classic but I just cannot say that I liked it. I've given it two stars for some beautiful quotes by Kerouac but the story as a whole irritated me. I like the idea of hitting the wide open road and can certainly relate. There were many segments of the book that reminded me of times on a road trip West taken last year. I am not a stranger to sleeping in vehicles and trying to live on as little money as possible and yet never feeling happier. Despite that this book was almost painful to read at times. The characters were unlikeable and forgive me for saying but most of them were pigs (I'm looking at you Sal) and not worth the pages it took to get to know them.
    • 2/5

      I have to admit, I found this classic a bit boring. That's probably why it took so long to read as I put it down part way through and picked it up again several weeks later, thinking "I really must finish this".

      I just couldn't understand why Sal was so obsessed with Dean..? Dean seemed to me such a loser and I was amazed that anyone would follow him around and look up to him. All the travelling around was interesting at times but on the whole I didn't really see why this book is seen as such a classic. Not for me.
    • 5/5
      "So in America when the sun goes down..." this whole paragraph, forever, like a prayer. <3
    • 2/5
      This book took quite awhile for me to get through. It was certainly an epic novel with wondrous adventure, though certain aspects conflicted with my personal opinions. The writing had to be adapted to, though this is makes sense concerning the year and voice it was written in.
      Over all, it was a worthwhile literary novel- if you're into that kind of thing... However, it was not my cup of tea.
    • 4/5
      Well. Having read the Original Scroll several times because it was love at first sentence, the realization set in that I needed to read the edited version. And it's very different from the Original Scroll. Better in a lot of ways, I think. The characters are still irresponsible, selfish, jerks with few redeeming qualities. But what pulls me in, time and time again, is the search for self. Knowing there's more and searching for it, whether it's on the road or, as in my case, through photography. I identified so strongly with the feeling of not fitting in and searching for my own way. And the language, I love the language. The frenetic energy, the firehose, it all makes me fall in love again and reminds me to keep searching for me.