So first off, who hasn’t wished for more in their life? Is there anyone that doesn’t wake up sometimes with fear, looking ahead in their life concerned about the conventional path that they seem to be stuck in? Who isn’t sometimes hungry, hungry, hungry for more, for more life, more excitement, more happiness, more…everything? It’s these deeply rooted desires that I feel Kerouac addresses in his novel.
I recently read something that sounded like something of a paradox. It said that if you want to write something that is general then you have to write about something very, very specific. That’s exactly what I think that Kerouac did, by deciding to write about his unique, specific life, he managed to transpose the lessons and thoughts of his own life to express an entire generation.
The conclusion of the novel struck me as being chock full of anecdotes and slight ambiguities (for me at least). When dean leaves sal stranded in mexico, instead of getting angry or bitter, sal understands him and accepts dean’s decision to leave. He didn’t go into detail about what he understood, I don’t even know if he completely or fully understood himself. But in a vague way, Sal saw that dean couldn’t stay with him in mexico. It at first struck me as odd, it seemed that mexico was going to be the perfect place for dean, a land of absolute freedom and interesting people he could dig for the rest of his life. So why did he need to leave so abruptly? Was it the ties that he held back home to his women (his two wives and his children)? I don’t think so; I think his decision to leave stemmed from the very fact that Mexico would have been perfect for him to stay in. Part of the beat tradition is to hit the road, to be in pursuit of something better, more exciting, always in chase of something just slightly ahead, “especially ahead, always ahead”. Mexico presented itself as too complete for dean, a land where all of the pursuits might’ve ended for him. And, as a patron saint of the “beat” philosophy, Dean had to remain in a place where the only viable option for at least a semblance of happiness is in the pursuit: the states. That’s partly the reason I see for him leaving behind Sal. Sal was his “adventure” buddy, and to confront the obstacle of going back to the states, where he had to live with imperfections, instead of staying with his buddy in the heavenly mexico, presented itself as too much for him to do, forcing him to take the trip back alone.
So in the end, are they happy? Is this the way that we would want our own lives to turn out? It’s hard to say exactly. I feel as though the greatest sentiment towards the end is…acceptance. They’ve settled into their lives, realized their obligations. Sal settled with his girlfriend, and Dean with his second wife. But has their beat spirit left them completely? Nope, not any more than has the sad image of Dean as Sal’s car pulls away in the end. Their ambition and dream for something better and their pursuits remain within them. It drives them awake, looking for meaning in the streets they pass, the people they meet, the places they visit. Kerouac only wrote about his life but in doing so, he managed to write about us all.
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