I'll never forget the briefest and best description of Jack Kerouac's, On The Road, given by a young man who like me was reading the book at the time. I was in my early twenties and he was about eighteen.
'Yeah it's brilliant he said. It's all "and then we did this, and then we went there, and then we got drunk, and then we had sex, and then we moved on, and then we fell asleep, and then and then and then"
Genius.
He went insane later in life and not for the first time I realised the brightest often do. But seriously this video is one beautiful piece of history. First I learned that beat generation meant 'sympathetic' and suddenly the Beat word made a lot more sense to me. Beaten up, beaten on. Only Kerouac could legitimately explain what it means. Secondly Jack goes on to read some of his work and I'm left wanting to read the book one more time if the road ever opens up for me again. Which it will. When I'm not expecting it.
