Comment on Gioia's (Pedro Diaz)

      Gioia, your idea is great overall. I think you will be able to write a very strong paper with the foundation that you already have. We all know that Sal and Dean are constantly “on the road”, but we never really ask why they are really doing it. At first, I was wondering how you would support the argument of happiness. Once I saw your outline however, I realized how many supports were available in the book and you have almost convinced me with just a few of your ideas that happiness is what started up their journey. Moreover, I love how you have already established a great number of quotes that you can use in your term paper. The one flaw that I found in your post was in your thesis as a whole. I feel as if you should reconsider the structure of your thesis because right now it does not flow very well. Other than that, I think you are ready to write a terrific paper.

Comment on Ari's (Gioia Kelleher)

Your outline is looking really good. I think your next step should be to try to find some quotes to support your arguments. My favorite argument that you present is the one about false perceptions. I think that On the Road is largely about one’s perception and how it can change. What is really interesting is that I wrote about how we are all inherently sad and you wrote about how we are all inherently selfish and I think that the novel exhibits both very well and that both are complementary to each other. I am really excited to see how your essay is going turn out.

Outline and Quotes

Warning, I had no idea what I was doing. Good luck.

Gioia Kelleher

On the Road Outline

Thesis: The fuel the drives Sal and Dean back and forth across the entire North American continent is their lust for happiness. Their lust is generated from their previous experiences such as World War Two and prison. 

Introduction:

Introduce the concept of self defined happiness and that many of Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty’s actions are prompted by their desire to find it. Introduce that Sal and Dean are different from past generations because of their experiences and that the history of the United States will show this. Also introduce the futility of their search.

Argument One:

First introduce the time period during which Sal and Dean grew up.

One the Road takes place after the Great Depression and World War Two, but before the turmoil of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960’s. They are stuck in a grey zone of American history.  

They were promised by their parents and their teachers that they would be happy if they followed the steps already created for them by previous generations, but what they have witnessed would tell them other wise, so instead they try to find it for themselves.

Sal wants his life to be extraordinary, not just what he has observed from the lives of other people. He does not want follow the steps all ready laid out for him; he does not believe that is where happiness lays. He does not just want to go to college, get married, buy a house, have children, pay taxes and die. He thinks that there’s got to be more to life than that.

Quotes:

“The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars.” – Sal (Part One Chapter One)

“What do you want out of life?" I asked, and I used to ask that all the time of girls. I don't know," she said. "Just wait on tables and try to get along." She yawned. I put my hand over her mouth and told her not to yawn. I tried to tell her how excited I was about life and the things we could do together; saying that, and planning to leave Denver in two days. She turned away wearily. We lay on our backs, looking at the ceiling and wondering what God had wrought when He made life so sad.”- Sal (Part III, Chapter 11)

            “Prison is where you promise yourself the right to live.”- Dean (Part II Chapter 3) This quote explains Dean’s madness.

Argument Two

Though their struggle and search is honorable, what results is their restlessness. Though the like to think their ideas and thoughts are uniquely theirs, they are shared by an entire generation. 

There is subtle change throughout the novel. Sal starts his first journey across the country full of exuberance, which is also evident in Kerouac’s writing. Kerouac starts the novel writing in long rolling sentences, which conveys Sal’s feelings at the time. But over time things start to change for Sal and his friends such as Dean and Carlo Marx. They loose the excitement, and become disillusioned.

The saddest part of this novel is that if anyone could have ended up happy it would have been Sal or Dean. No one else lusted after freedom as much as they did. Even when having every opportunity to be happy, it is an inherent part of human nature to be sad.

As long as Sal and Dean are on the road there is a possibility that they will find what they think will solve all their sadness, but in the end they realize that it does not exist. This is why they end up going to Mexico. 

Quotes:

"running from one falling star to another" [Part II, Chapter 4]. They are all reaching for this goal.

“…’I said, ‘Gene, that’s the prettiest song.’
‘It’s the sweetest I know,’ he said with a smile.
‘I hope you get where you’re going, and be happy when you do.’
‘I always make out and move along one way or the other’ (Part One, Chapter Four). Right from the beginning of his journey he begins to witness everyone’s sorrow. 

“So in America when the sun goes down and I sit on the old broken-down river pier watching the long, long skies over New Jersey and sense all that raw land that rolls in one unbelievable huge bulge over to the West Coast, and all that road going, and all the people dreaming in the immensity of it, and in Iowa I know by now the children must be crying in the land where they let the children cry, and tonight the stars'll be out, and don't you know that God is Pooh Bear? the evening star must be drooping and shedding her sparkler dims on the prairie, which is just before the coming of complete night that blesses the earth, darkens all the rivers, cups the peaks and folds the final shore in, and nobody, nobody knows what's going to happen to anybody besides the forlorn rags of growing old, I think of Dean Moriarty, I even think of Old Dean Moriarty the father we never found, I think of Dean Moriarty.” I’ll figure out a way to shorten this when I am actually writing the paper.

 “all the time I was thinking of Dean and how he got back on the train and rode over three thousand miles over that awful land and never knew why he had come anyway, except to see me” (Part V, Chapter 1) We have to experience the sadness of Sal having to loose his faith in his hero.

“We saw a vision of the entire Western Hemisphere rockribbing clear down to Tierra del Fuego and us flying down the curve of the world into other tropics and other worlds. "Man, this will finally take us to IT!" said Dean with definite faith. He tapped my arm. ‘Just wait and see. Hoo!” (Part IV, Chapter III)

“All had their hands outstretched. They had come down from the back mountains and higher places to hold forth their hands for something they thought civilization could offer, and they never dreamed the sadness and the poor broken delusion of it. They didn’t know that a bomb had come that could crack all our bridges and roads and reduce them to jumbles, and we would be as poor as they someday, and stretching out our hands in the same, same way” (Part IV, Chapter 6)

Comment on Pedro's Post (Meagan Adler)

I think that your idea is great and will make a really strong term paper. Your outline is well thought out and will be good support for your thesis. The representation of the Beat Generation is one of the most significant parts of the novel and your choice to write a term paper on it is great.  I can't wait to read the paper; there is definitely ample support, especially with areas such as the role of women during the time.  Kerouac brilliantly uses Dean as the leader of the Beat Generation who rebels against the societal institutions and tries to become an individual.  The idea that the generation shifted the nation to the liberal left is also significant. I think that introducing the author's background at the beginning of the paper is a really good way to start off.  Great idea! I think your paper is going to be very strong. 

Comment on Meagan's Post (Ari Garvett)

   I just love the idea of your entire research paper. To tie Kerouac with Kafka is brilliant as for one they are connected but also allows your reader to observe and perceive different perspectives of multiple men. Also, I believe your discussion of the church, family, and society will be an interesting twist in your paper. To me, its brilliance stems from the fact that it is not just a discussion on the novel but a relevant and unique thesis that affects people of both eras.

Comment on Felipe's Post (Ari Garvett)

   I believe you are definitely on the right track. I too am tying the Beat Generation into my essay and feel that it is necessary to discuss the social impacts of it. I also agree in your decision to discuss its impacts while the Beat Generation was still in action and on how the movement has affected the ideologies of modern day society. I feel however that you should also include more of the novel in this research paper as it is the foundation of it. I understand you will introduce the characters but I feel that you should include how your thesis ties directly to the novel.

The Lemon Squeezer Research Paper Outline

THESIS- Social movements such as the beat generation are used as a tool that allows society to further believe in a false movement of progression and advancement of the human race; however, in the novel, On The Road, readers are able to observe that no matter how much humanity ‘progresses’, it will still indulge in a pool of lemon squeezers.

I believe this topic is a unique yet relevant subject that has direct ties to both the novel and modern day society. 

I. Introduction-Defining the Beat Generation
    1. A History of The Beat Movement
    2. Discussion of the Ideology of the generation & its effects on America
    3. How Kerouac tied the ideology throughout the novels and within his characters
    4. Discussion on Lemon Squeezers and how it ties into the novel and society
    5. Thesis

II. Human Psychology- our false perception of progress. In the end we fall under one common denominator: preservation of our beliefs and protection of our bodies. We are all inherently selfish
    1. A history of the human race before the introduction of globalized belief systems
    2. Discussion on how belief systems like religion give a false sense of morality
    3. The concept of selfishness and how it effects every being on this universe
    4. Brief description of how this ties into the novel and the concept of lemon squeezers

III. The epitome of a lemon squeezer.
    1. The Contradictions between what Dean Professes and How He Acts. Specific events that will be able to prove the thesis.

    2. Illustration of the contradiction of the beat movement and how despite its ideology, they too were a bunch of lemon squeezers.

IV. False Perceptions
    1. How Our False Perceptions of the World and Our Devotion to movements such as the Beat Movement weakens us as a species.

    2. Comparison of a world without religion and a ‘progressive’ world.
    3. How modern day society continues to be infected with lemon squeezers.
    4. Sal’s false perceptions in his hero Dean.

V. Conclusion

The Beat Generation

First off, I just noticed the new name of the blog. I love it. Alright, here we go.

Topic - On The Road in context: The Beat Generation and its significance

I. The Beat Generation

• Introduce the Beats and give some background
• Get into the significance of the movement and some of the people who represent it, and more importantly the ideology
• I'm basically trying to give a crash-course definition of the movement in this section
• End it with certain emphasis on Kerouac

II.The book as a representation of the Beat generation

• Who the characters are and what the story is
• Mechanic as metaphor: the whole point is that nothing happens
• How this book would be read in the 50's
• This section will be clearly connected to the previous

III. The Hippies

• Go into the whole idea of this being the direct aftermath
• Link this movement to the Beats
• This is basically a continuation of the history-related concepts presented earlier in the paper

IV. The modern impact

• I want to prove that there are various aspects of the Beats in the Millennial generation
• I plan to connect certain ideas of that counter culture to modern keyboard activism
• I should probably link the Beats to the modern hipsters but I'm not sure if I'll do that because it seems kind of insubstantial
• I also plan to talk about ways in which the Beats influenced modern politics
• taxes are no longer patriotic (I understand the credit given to Vietnam but without a movement of people questioning authority like that the effect wouldn't be there)
• Individual vs collective in terms of fairness (I don't credit these ideas to the Beats but they definitely brought that stuff to the table)

Topic Choice, Outline, Thesis

Topic: To what extent does the novel accurately represent its time?

I chose this topic because I felt that it was going to be the choice that would be the easiest to write in terms of supports and my ability to explain it. 

*The letters (A, B, C, D) are subject to change*

I. Introduction

   A. Introduce the author and give a background of his life (specifically time period he grew up in, etc.)

   B. Introduce the novel as a whole and when it was published.

   C. Discuss the novel’s relevance at the time, the influence on its audience, and provide a quick plot description mentioning the Beat Generation and what else the time period is known for.

   D. Thesis: Jack Kerouac’s novel goes beyond describing a journey; instead, through the manipulation of characters and their actions, the author is ultimately able to portray one of the most complex time periods in American history.

II. The Novel’s Representation of Different Cultures

   A. Sal and Dean’s travels across the country and its effect on their overall perspective.

   B. African American Culture

   C. Western American Culture

III. Gender Roles

   A. Introduce the Roles in the Novel

   B. Discuss the treatment of women by characters such as Sal and Dean.

   C. How the character’s talk about women.

IV. The Rise of a New Generation

   A. Reintroduce the Beat Generation

   B. Novel’s Influence

   C. Comparison to Hippies

   D. How do they view cultural differences?

V. Conclusion

Thesis and Outline (Meagan Adler)

Thesis: As Sal and Dean aimlessly wander throughout the nation on their cyclical journey, Jack Kerouac underscores the Kafkaesque idea that the individual is destined to fail as he is inevitably forced to conform to the socially accepted member of the flock in a restrictive country where societal institutions are ultimately inescapable.  

Introduction

·      Introduce the idea of societal institutions and their purpose in a country

·      Relate the purpose of Sal and Dean’s journey to the societal institutions

o   how these institutions limit he individual

o   how the Beat Generation, which Dean leads, tries to escape these institutions

·      Discuss the idea that Sal and Dean constantly end back home, under the roof of the societal institution of family because these institutions are inescapable, restrict the “young, wild, and free” mentality

·      Thesis: As Sal and Dean aimlessly wander throughout the nation on their cyclical journey, Jack Kerouac underscores the Kafkaesque idea that the individual is destined to fail as he is inevitably forced to conform to the socially accepted member of the flock in a restrictive country where societal institutions are ultimately inescapable. 

Body Paragraphs  

·      Institution of State

o   Discuss the many times they have been stopped by the police

o   Discuss the need for money

o   How do they try to rebel? By stealing.  Yet ultimately, their need for money becomes so important that they turn to family. (institutions support each other).  For example, they constantly turn to Sal’s aunt for money.

o   State ultimately wins as they return back home and conform to society’s expectations.

·      Institution of Family

o   Constantly return back home on their cyclical journey, under the familial roof

o   Dean’s search for his dad

·      Institution of Church  

o   Institution of church implements itself within the Beat culture, for Sal sees Dean as his God

o   Sal cannot be an individual, for he has conformed to the almost religious culture of the Beat Generation

·      Fringes of Society

o   Whenever Sal sees the fringes of society he turns back home

o   Shows that his journey to become an individual ultimately fails because society wins

§  Society purposely allows the fringes to exist to pull people back

·      The Shift to the Liberal Left

o   Although the Beat Generation fails to become complete individuals, it does shift society to the liberal left

Conclusion

o   Whether it is through Dean and Sal’s constant need for money, Dean’s search for his father, or the religion of the Beat Generation, Kerouac shows us that society fails the individual.