Counterculture Classics or Hipster Essentials?
An Indigo Fiction Blogger’s Perspective.
From authors as diverse as Jack Kerouac and Charles Bukowski to Martin Amis and William Burroughs, what the writers of these novels have in common is a counterculture quality. They are rebels. These authors certainly wrote great works that dared and continue to dare their, often young, readers to see the world in new ways. You would never say these fellows, men all, think outside of the box for when you live as far beyond that borderline we call normal as writers like Burroughs and Bukowski did, you don’t need to think outside of the box: you live there.
Jack Kerouac’s On The Road
Legend has it that in a fit of inspiration, fuelled by the kind of illicit drugs that help one to stay up hours and days, Jack Kerouac sat down at his typewriter and did not get up until three weeks later, when he had churned out his masterpiece (indeed, in 2008, the Original Scroll uncut version was published, duplicating the format of Kerouac’s working version). Of this “feat,” Truman Capote (“Breakfast at Tiffany’s”) famously said with not a little bitterness: “That’s not writing, that’s typing.” Of course you need only delve in and experience On The Road so lovingly filled with the poetry of its rapid language and the brilliant characterizations—most notably of the story’s anti-hero Dean Moriarty—to realize how exaggerated that famous tale of the three weeks must be. In truth, Kerouac had been working on some form or other of this largely autobiographical narrative for years, though he did finally write a rapid version of the text, the result of which is the riffing, jazz-improvisational-like style that distinguishes On The Road and helped make it one of the 100 best novels in the English language, according to the Modern Library. One can only wonder if the upcoming film version will please this title’s devoted fans; the director has his work cut out for him.
Click Hipster Counterculture Classicness to continue reading about Charles Bukowski and other legendary scribes, none of whom were hipsters in the obnoxious sense.