In this week’s reading, Sal, “weatherbeaten and gray” (pg.55), becomes bored with his own mundanely dull life out west. The reader almost feels a sense of relief as he finally comes to the realization that his westward journey has not changed his naively mediocre personality. He is that “haggard ghost” (pg.54) trying to search for a new identity that is seemingly nonexistent. Furthermore, he is consumed by a hopeless sense of dejection as desperately asks himself, “Oh where is this girl I love?” (pg.71). Prior to his journey Sal is preoccupied with the false sense of hope that he will become a changed man as he begins his journey on “Route 6 across America” (pg.71), yet he now comes to the realization that as he comes to the end of America he has “nowhere to go but back” (pg.71). He becomes “completely bored” (pg.65) not only with the dull Banana King Remi praises, but with life itself out west. Sal realizes that he has nobody and is a nobody and that he lives in solitude in the “loneliness of San Francisco” (pg.67). In my opinion, I feel like Sal has to find himself before he can find this girl he is looking for. He has almost a sense of innocent naivety, in which makes him an easy target for people like Remi to influence. If anything, Sal has become slightly changed for the worse, as he realizes he is a “natural-born thief” (pg.65), like everyone else in America. I particularly powerful point of the reading was when Sal second guessingly asks himself “Why had I come here?” (pg.69); this shows that he doubts his decision to become this transformed man in the west. Overall, through this weeks reading I realize that I no longer sympathize with Sal because he is such a uninterestingly characterless narrator.
The reaction’s that both Meagan and I had this week paralleled each other quite interestingly. We both realize that Sal needs to find himself before he continues on any other journey in his life. Indeed, Sal can no longer go forward both physically and metaphorically. He cannot drown himself in the Pacific’s waters and he cannot continue to possess the false hope that the geography and people of the west will change him. The only stimulus that has any chance to save Sal is himself. He has to work towards answering the question of “who am I” through journeying on the road and allowing himself to develop with the road rather than the road develop him as that would be superficial and impermanent.
ReplyDeleteFurthermore, I understand where Meagan is going with her line “overall, through this weeks reading I realize that I no longer sympathize with Sal because he is such a uninterestingly characterless narrator.” Sal is characterless because he does not know himself as a human being and needs to confront this immediately. However, I unlike Meagan, believe this strategy that Kerouac employs to prove quite interesting as he can steer the story in any direction at this point. Basically, Sal is a blank piece of paper waiting to be written on, and as I said in my previous blog the question that forms is will Sal be able to snap out of this hypnotic trance that he has trapped himself in and become more of an individual, or will he remain stuck in the alternate universe for the remainder of the novel.