Questions and Answers for On the Road
On the Road
What are some major themes of Jack Kerouac's work On the Road?
Jack Kerouac’s book On the Road explores a variety of themes, including the following The desire for adventure The desire for freedom The yearning for originality An opposition to restrictions...
On the Road
What figurative language devices were used in On the Road by Jack Kerouac? How were they used in the text? Provide...
When discussing how figurative language is used in writing, we are looking at devices like metaphors, similes, personification and more. Most good writers will often use many, if not all,...
On the Road
Identify a rhetorical message intrinsic to On the Road by Jack Kerouac. The message should be examined through the...
The rhetorical message of Kerouac's work exists in what he wants the reader to derive from it. Kerouac's message embraces the need to pursue and cherish individual freedom. Through different...
On the Road
What does On the Road say about belonging?
I think that Kerouac's work speaks to the idea that human consciousness is predicated upon the idea that belonging is an important part of being in the world. Even if one does a good job of...
On the Road
What is the falling action of the book On the Road?
When we think about plot, the falling action is the section of plot that comes after the climax and before the resolution of the novel. This is normally not a very large section of the story, but...
On the Road
In On the Road, what does "the road" itself stand for?
It is clear that for both Dean and Sal, the road is a symbol for restless wandering and for new experience. Very quickly in the novel, Sal becomes hooked on travelling to the next place, and no...
On the Road
What is the rising action of On the Road?
The rising action is depicted primarily through exposition by Sal, who tells us of his journey west and back again, winding across the United States in search of a higher intellectual or spiritual...
On the Road
What is Jack Kerouac's narrative style in his book On the Road?
Jack Kerouac’s narrative On the Road displays not just one style but various styles of writing, and it is partly this stylistic diversity that gives the book much of its interest and appeal....
On the Road
What is the exposition in On the Road?
The exposition of any plot is the initial stage of the plot diagram where the main characters are introduced and the kind of conflict that they face is also presented. The beginning of this book...
On the Road
What are the main tones that Jack Kerouac uses in this book On the Road?
The tones used in Jack Kerouac’s narrative On the Road are various. Sometimes the tone is colloquial, as in the statement “I was beginning to get the bug like Dean.” Sometimes the tone is vivid...
On the Road
How does Jack Kerouac use diction and literary devices in On the Road?
Diction (that is, word choice) and literary devices are especially important elements in Jack Kerouac’s narrative titled On the Road. The style of Kerouac’s narrative seems almost as significant as...
On the Road
What is the resolution of the book On the Road?
When we think about plot, the last stage of any plot is the resolution. This is where the conflict that has driven the story throughout is finally brought to some sort of conclusion, as the term...
On the Road
What is the climax of the book On the Road?
The climax of the novel is Dean and Sal's wild excursion to Mexico City. It seems like they have found something alive and vital there. Sal says, "We wandered in a frenzy and in a dream." All of...
On the Road
What is Jack Kerouac's vision of individuality?
In articulating his conception of freedom, Kerouac echoes much of the post World War II boundless energy in American freedom. Sal and Dean jump into the car and drive, and drive, and drive. There...
On the Road
How does Jack Kerouac's On the Road affirm or reject conformity of the 1950s?
On The Road represents both nonconformity and conformity in terms of Jack Kerouac’s attitude toward American society. The novel shows a group of characters who explicitly refuse to conform to...
On the Road
Behind us lay the whole of America and everything Dean and I had previously known about life and life on the road. We...
On the Road reflects and represents postmodernist literature, art, and philosophy, where rules of conduct, expectations, and social norms following World War II were questioned and then challenged....
On the Road
Explain the theme of On the Road, and relate the theme to postmodernism.
One theme of Kerouac’s On the Road would be anti-traditionalism. The cookie-cutter housing of Levittowns and behavior of “sameness” regarding social norms of the 1950s are both challenged in this...
On the Road
Compare the book On The Road by Kerouac and The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by Baum. Both books talked about a journey.
Indeed, the journey element is present in both works. In a way, Sal and Dean go on a journey to find "home" and Dorothy is on her journey to go back to "home." Sal and Dean have much less...
On the Road
In On the Road, in what ways does alcohol represent Sal's need for new experiences?
Alcohol plays a big role in the work of Jack Kerouac, and On the Road is no exception. One of the most prominent themes in this novel is the importance of having new experiences, altering one's...
On the Road
What is it about Dean that Sal is so attracted to?
Dean Moriarty exemplifies freedom and self-expression and non-conformity, all the things that Sal aspires to emulate. Sal is not alone in his adoration. Dean, and Keroac, became reluctant symbols...
On the Road
The climax of a story is the most exciting or intense point in the story. What is the climax of On the Road?
Jack Kerouac’s On the Road is a 1957 novel about the travels of Kerouac and his friends across North America. The novel is a roman à clef, with many of the characters standing in for real figures...
On the Road
The concept of "it" is prevalent in the novel. What is "it" for Sal and Dean?
I think that this becomes one of the central issues in the novel. The idea of "it" and its pursuit is something that drives both Sal and Dean. The moment and living for it represents a critical...
On the Road
In Jack Kerouac's On the Road, what might be some good analytical questions to ask about chapters 9-11 of Part Three?
A number of analytical questions might be asked about chapters 9-11 of Part Three of Jack Kerouac’s One the Road. Among such questions are the following: How does Dean explain his love of cars,...
On the Road
About Dean Moriarty's portrait, what was the role in the novel and Sal's life?
Dean in many ways is the guy that basically makes things happen for Sal and throughout the novel. Even though Sal knows that sometimes Dean is dangerous and that he isn't always very considerate...
On the Road
What are some differences in style and context between Burroughs' Naked Lunch and Kerouac's On the Road?
Published in September 1957, On the Road tells the story of Jack Kerouac's years traveling around the United States with his friend Neal Cassady. Named Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty in the novel,...
On the Road
Explain Dean and Sal's relationship with women in On the Road.
They refuse any type of relationship conformity. There ideas of marriage completely go against the societal mold; there is no concept of "until death do us part," it is merely a mutual agreement to...
On the Road
Jack Kerouac said he wanted to capture the image and intensity of feeling in On the Road. Does he accomplish...
Although Jack Kerouac became well-known for the informality of his style and an apparently loose structure, including elements of stream of consciousness, he was a highly self-conscious craftsman...
On the Road
What causes Sal Paradise to give up life on the road?
Sal Paradise knows what he wants out of life—or thinks he does, at any rate. He wants to escape his stultifying existence as a struggling young writer living with his aunt in New Jersey and head...
On the Road
Why did Jack Kerouac chose the topic and themes of the novel given the Zeitgeist in which the work was created?
Jack Kerouac chose the themes he wrote about carefully and they certainly do reflect the time in which he wrote. The theme of rebellion was important to Kerouac because he would have been...
On the Road
What part of the reading shows exemplified personal freedom representing a break from tradition?
When Sal decides to leave and hitchhike out West to Denver, it is an example of personal freedom breaking from tradition. Sal is embracing his own idea of personal freedom. While his aunt warns...
On the Road
Identify how the rhetorical message of freedom to find oneself is inherent in the employed conventions of On the Road...
The conventions that Kerouac employs in On The Road help to convey a rhetorical message that extols the freedom to find oneself. Technique embraces and conveys the idea of non- conformity and...
On the Road
What would be a good thesis for an argumentative paper on this book?
One potential way to look at this book is to trace how Sal Paradise, the protagonist, changes throughout the book in response to his friendship with Dean Moriarty. You could make a chronology (or,...
On the Road
How does the first person narration in On the Road affect the novel?
Ah! Good ol' Jack Kerouac! He was one of the most popular Beatniks of the time period. On the Road was instrumental for popularizing the run-on sentence! What I mean by that is that the Beats...
On the Road
Audio book I have actually never read on the road however, I have listened to it about 8 times. I am absolutely...
very interesting comments. I really think you need to read the actual book now! You're so familar with the language but still might be really surprised by the different experience of reading the...
On the Road
In the book On the Road, while picking grapes who does Sal compare himself to?
I think you may mean the episode in chapter 13 when Sal and Terry have hitch-hiked to Sabinal. They have been trying to find work picking grapes, without success. Sal lies on his back in the town...
On the Road
In On The Road, what key events led to Sal growing up?
Sal is a character who is depicted as loving Dean and showing kindness towards him even though he recognises very quickly that Dean is a character who is ultimately very selfish and self-serving....
On the Road
Could it be said that On the Road is countercultural without pretense?
I think that it could be said that Kerouac's work operates as a base of the counterculture identity. I think that debate and discussion might emerge with the idea of "without pretense." At the...
On the Road
Did the use of pseudonyms for Jack Kerouac's friends and censorship of the "unsavory" parts of On the Road speak...
In the published version of his work titled On the Road, Jack Kerouac used pseudonyms instead of the names of many of the real persons he had mentioned when drafting the book. He also (it has been...
On the Road
Discuss the following statement: "Sal's shared values of rejecting mainstream, White, middle class culture creates a...
I think that there is some validity and some resonance to the statement. Sal and Dean do define themselves and are able to share this understanding of consciousness because of their values that...
On the Road
At the beginning of the novel, Sal Paradise admits to having ambivalent feelings about Dean, at first thinking him to...
On one hand, Dean represents the freedom of the Beat Generation—unwilling to be tied down, always on the move. However, Sal does find problems with the darker side of this trait: for instance,...
On the Road
Do you think that Sal Paradise was successful in finding spiritual and emotional healing and salvation by the end of...
I would probably qualify the statement a bit. I think that Dean has helped Sal understand more about himself, his own sense of reality, and his nation. Yet, I think that Sal is not entering...