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Transcript of Milijana Ivo Road Narratives in American Film and Fiction The Search for Home and Family: The Curved...
Ivo 1
Milijana Ivo
Dr Amy Mohr
Road Narratives in American Film and Fiction
26 February 2013
The Search for Home and Family: The Curved Roads That Lead Back
Home – A Desire For Family in Jack Kerouac’s On The Road
The search for peace of heart and mind precipitates and
drives the journeys of the characters in Jack Kerouac’s On the
Road. In a sense, these characters are on a path (“the road”) of
searching for a sense of both psycho-emotional and physical rest.
In this search for a better way of life and living, characters
such as Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty set on a path of self-
realization and self-discovery, each (and some of their friends
too) trying to realize and fulfill their notion of an ideal
lifestyle. The search for a better life for both Sal and Dean is
invariably laced with a desire not to conform to the status quo;
a desire to chart their own paths in life different form what the
society in which they live considers the norm. For instance,
concerning Sal Paradise, he begins his travels across the US just
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after he divorces his wife. In a sense therefore, having failed
to find happiness in what society promises is a source of
happiness for ‘normal’ adult men – marriage – he decides to chart
his course and find his own happiness according to his own terms.
On his part, Dean Moriarty eschews many of the entities,
institutions and practices that the society considers to be the
norm. Dean is essentially a free spirit who revels in being a
maverick and a non-conformist, sometimes even to the detriment of
the relationships he has with his friends. He befriends many
different women, and lives with them temporarily until he finds
the next thing that excites his fancy. His lifestyle is
completely unlike what others in his society would consider to be
the norm for a grown adult man. In the end, however, after
travelling many roads and experiences the cultures and lifestyles
of different people, Sal begins to long for the very things that
he desired to be rid of such as marriages. Sal sees the futility
of living a life of travel and partying and freedom. Dean
meanwhile is constantly seeking out his father – an authority
figure in his life that symbolizes the restriction of freedom.
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Dean’s father had abandoned theme when Dean was a child.
Therefore, even though Sal and Dean seek to be different, free,
without responsibilities and seemingly in no committed love
relationships, they are unwittingly seeking a sense of belonging,
love and family that has been denied them at some point in their
lives.
The Desire to be Free
Sal’s journeys and excursions throughout the US are
essentially an expression of a desire to experience a freedom
from the restrictions and responsibilities of adult life. Known
as the Beat Generation, the ideal lifestyle expressed by the post
WWII generation in the US entailed a desire to be nonconformist
(Spangler 310). After the Second World War, the surreal
experience of the war, and the near catastrophic edge that the
armies of Nazi Germany and its allies had pushed the entire world
forced the Beat Generation into introspection. Ideally, the Beat
Generation was concerned about such metaphysical questions as
what the meaning of life was, and how to best live life, as the
war had led them to realize that life was precious and short
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(Spangler 310). The Beat Generation thus desired to disentangle
itself from all forms of lifestyles that defined the status quo
before the Second World War. Stable jobs, long-term marriages,
commitment to singular goals, and overall ‘by-the-book’
lifestyles were shunned for more adventurous, explorative
lifestyles. Both Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty epitomize the
adventurous nature of the Beat Generation. Both are in search of
entities and goals that they feel will guide them towards living
more fulfilled lives compared to the kind of lives they have
lived before: essentially, both men are on a soul-searching
mission. Sal seeks to find a sense of peace that is indefinable
yet signifies the fulfillment of his sense of self-actualization
and self-discovery. When he sets out initially, Sal states that
“Somewhere along the line I knew there would be girls, visions,
everything; somewhere along the line the pearl would be handed to
me” (Kerouac 31). This search for freedom is however linked to a
dislike and loathing for all things that restrict freedom –
particularly long-term relationships (including marriages),
extended and long-term job opportunities and practices, and even
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friendships that betray a hint of long-term commitment. Both Sal
and Dean eschew being in marriages and long-term committed
relationships with women. After his divorce, Sal seeks out women
for ephemeral pleasures and sooner leaves them in search for new
and fresher challenges. Dean on his part engages women for brief
periods, and has been married twice yet still desires the brief
companionship of women he meets in party scenes and other social
places. Both Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty do not hold jobs for
extended periods. It is as if the idea of maintaining a job for
long pins them down to a particular place (both geographically
and psychologically), and being keen on discovery and travel,
they both quickly quit from the many jobs that they undertake.
Sal works as a night watchman very briefly before quitting to
continue with his travel, while Dean is constantly changing jobs.
Ideally, once they receive some form of monetary pay from these
brief work engagements, they quickly think about using the money
for travel and partying, until the money is completely spent,
and they again need to work, but only to gain an income that they
use for travelling. This pattern of work-and-travel defines their
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desire to keep on exploring and discovering themselves
(especially for Sal, since Dean is in essence a free spirit by
his very nature). The search for Sal’s elusive “pearl” defines
their desire to be free, free from any responsibilities that will
tie them down permanently to a place; and free from any entities
that the society would define as the norm – such as marriages and
family.
Expression of Male Dominance and Masculinity
The search for freedom and a sense of self for Sal is tied
to the manner in which he expresses his masculinity vis-à-vis his
engagements with women. Ditto Dean Moriarty. In a sense, an
escape from a committed relationship to a single woman (for
instance in marriage) and an ability to engage in fickle short
term relationships expresses the freedom that both Sal and Dean
seek. Additionally, Sal and Dean’s masculine expressions are
unfortunately at the expense of having proper relationships with
women. Dean is openly cruel and rude to the women in his life. He
constantly leaves his second wife Camille with their child and
runs off to party and travel. His relationships with some of the
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women he engages with, such as Marylou, are violent and plagued
with mistrust.
Dean likes to be the center of attention and the focal
entity in any engagement, endeavor or situation in which he is.
His desire for dominance can be attributed to his desire to
express his masculinity in any and all situations (Mortenson 51).
In a sense, Dean escapes from being accountable (and thus
maintains his freedom) by ensuring that all the relationships he
engages in follow his terms only. He dominates his relationships
with women and even his male friends (including Sal) in a desire
to showcase his masculinity and subsequently maintain his
freedom. Dean is able to scrupulously maintain his dominance in
relationships by bolting out any time the balance of power in
these relationships begins to shift to the other party. For
instance, whenever his second wife Camille begins to demand that
he fulfils his responsibilities as a husband and father, he runs
of to his other women, or starts to attend all manner of parties
and visits his friends, all in an effort to maintain his dominant
masculine nature in the relationship with Camille. In the case of
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his relationship with Marylou, he conveniently leaves her
whenever he feels that she is getting too close to him, sometimes
even using threats of violence in order to keep Marylou “in her
place”.
Dean Moriarty’s lack of commitment for any cause or
relationship is traceable to his own relationship (or lack
thereof) with his father. In a sense, Dean is on an extended
journey in search of his vagabond father, with whom he has never
had a proper father-son relationship. This sense of loss as
regards a lack of a father figure in his life has haunted Dean
into his adult life, and he appears to have a distorted sense of
masculine expression (Napelee 72). According to Dean’s own
understanding (derived from his own experience with his father)
of manhood, the more detached from those close to you one is, the
more masculine one becomes (Napelee 73). In the many journeys and
travels across the US that he takes (and even outside the US into
Mexico), he is constantly on the lookout for his father. In an
attempt to fill this gap in his sense of self (a gap as a result
of a lack of a proper relationship with his father) Dean overly
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expresses what is his own understanding of manhood. Similar to
the manner in which his father abandoned him, Dean consistently
and intermittently abandons his wives and children. He eschews
commitment and a sense of responsibility – mirroring the life of
his hobo father.
Sal similarly displays a dislike for commitment to long-term
relationships that defines his understanding of what an
expression of masculinity entails. Sal expresses a queer love for
the life that his friend Dean Moriarty lives. From the outset,
Sal continuously seeks to justify Dean’s erratic lifestyle to
their mutual friends and acquaintances. Sal views Dean as
expressing his ideal lifestyle insofar as seeking freedom and
being free is concerned: “he's got the secret that we're all
busting to find out,” (Kerouac 89) says Sal concerning his friend
Dean’s unsettled disposition and love for travel and freedom. By
opting for a divorce from his wife instead of opting to mend his
relationship with his wife, Sal – from the outset – sets out to
ensure that all the relationships he gets into with women do not
leave him similarly devastated. Sal’s notions on what it means to
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be a man are inevitably tied to his belief in being free. For
Sal, a ‘proper’ man is one who is free – free to travel, free to
relate with different women, and free to chose the kind of life
one wishes to live (Foxe 45).
‘The Road’ and the Search for Freedom and a New Meaning in Life
The road as a physical entity has both literal and symbolic
meaning in the Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. On the literal level,
the road directly implies the many roads, paths, and highways
that the major characters in the novel pass through in their
various numerous journeys. Even as a physical entity, the many
roads that the characters pass through ensure movement (and
sometimes progress) in the lives of the characters, especially
for Sal Paradise (Spangler 310). When Sal moves from one state to
another, he experiences the cultures of the different places he
visits and stays, utilizing the information and knowledge gained
for comparative purposes in relation to his life. This is
especially true when the particular road he is travelling in
leads him to the neighboring country of Mexico (Skinazi 86).
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The roads in the novel symbolize the journey to self-
actualization and freedom that characters such as Sal and Dean
seek. Sal is out to find an elusive state of freedom, shunning
all responsibilities that will tie and peg him down to a
particular place for extended periods. Sal and Dean are intent on
disassociating themselves from all entities that define ‘normal’
life in contemporary post World War II United States (Metz 65).
While the society in which they lived would define success
(especially for a man) as climbing the corporate or academic
ladder as well as raising a family, for Sal and Dean, their
definition of success hinges on moving as far away as is possible
from these identities of manhood imposed on them by society. The
Beat Generation thus seeks to find its own ‘roads’, because the
roads that they had been made to follow by society (and by
extension, the State) prior to World War II had almost brought
the world to an apocalyptic end going by the loss of life and
property experienced in the Second World War (Spangler 311). In a
way therefore, both Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty are keen to
prove the society in which they live wrong. Their objective (both
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individually and collectively) is to chart a path that ensures
that individual liberty and personal goals are not lost or
sacrificed on the altar of conformity. In a sense, conquering
the road provides a different state of accomplishment that
additionally confers a sense of freedom (Bill 396).
“Travelling in Circles”: The Lack of Progress in The Lives of Sal
and Dean As An Indicator of Their Unexpressed Desire For Love,
Family and A Sense of Belonging
While travel tends to define any coming of age story, this
is hardly the case with Sal and Dean. While Sal does experience a
sense of disillusionment with the life of constant travel and
partying, Dean steadfastly and defiantly holds on to this
lifestyle to the very end. Still, Sal retains his admiration for
Dean’s lifestyle to the very end, letting on the fact that Dean’s
travels and activities are constantly on his mind even after they
finally part ways, “I think of Dean Moriarty, I even think of Old
Dean Moriarty the father we never found, I think of Dean
Moriarty” (Kerouac 301). Therefore, the roads are ideally places
of enlightenment but not necessarily progress; of reflection but
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not necessarily active engagement; of discovery but no personal
advancement.
Ultimately, Sal and Dean are unwittingly seeking the very
sense of security and sense of belonging to family from which
they seek to escape. This can be seen in Sal and Dean’s obsession
with various aspects of family life. For Sal, his brief stay in
Mexico gave him a close up view of the importance of family and
community and the interaction between these two entities. Sal
gets sick with dysentery, and while his supposed friend Dean
leaves him, the Mexicans take proper care of him (Kerouac 158).
Additionally, while Sal largely enjoys the travels, he is
consistently plagued with an overwhelming sense of depression and
loneliness; betraying his desire to belong within a familial or
communal unit (Haslam 445). On the other hand, Dean’s desire for
a family-like set up (despite his fervent attempts at escaping
from the same) can be summed up with his stubborn desire to meet
up with his father who abandoned him when he was a child. In a
sense, Dean has never been able to overcome the sense of loss
that he felt as a fatherless child. Dean is thus stuck in an
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idealist past, a past where he lived within a home with both
parents, and with the attendant sense of security and love that
such a setting confers to a child. In seeking out his father,
Dean is essentially seeking out the sense of security and love
that a family setting bequeaths upon one. Ideally, until he is
able to overcome this sense of loss, he is unable to share the
love that bubbles within him with his family and friends
(Mortenson 62).
“Mexican Hospitality” in Barbara Kingsolver’s The Bean Trees
The one instant that Sal recognizes the importance of strong
friendships anchored within a communal or familial context occurs
while Sal and Dean are in Mexico. After he is abandoned while
sick by Dean, he is taken care of until he is well by
acquaintances and virtual strangers in Mexico. Besides this one
instant, the Mexicans as portrayed in Jack Kerouac’s On the Road
are happy go lucky persons intent only on partying and
celebrating. However, the critical difference between the
Mexicans and the Americans who visit (Sal, Dean and their
friends) is that the Mexicans are able to juggle the two balls of
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family-responsibility and desire-for-freedom. This ability to
balance these two critical yet sometime competing entities in
life ensures that the Mexicans are able to derive the benefits of
both worlds. Sal and Dean fail in this balancing act, and for
them it is all or nothing. Many of the Mexicans as portrayed in
the novel enjoy the party scene as much as Sal and Dean do, but
have homes and families to go back to after all the partying and
celebrating is done (Himmelwright 121). For Sal and Dean however,
even though as stated earlier they are unwittingly seeking for
the very sense of family they are intent on escaping from, family
responsibilities and freedom cannot go together.
It is while in Mexico that Sal finally concedes that his
friend Dean was narcissistic and selfish as concerns his
relationships with those around him. Sal had stubbornly denied
the accusations that many of their mutual friends had leveled on
Dean concerning his inability to establish true and reciprocal
friendships. In a way, Sal’s sojourn in Mexico – especially after
he gets sick – leads him to conclude that the life of constant
travel and endless partying had its drawbacks too. Therefore, the
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lifestyle of the people in Mexico plays a critical role in aiding
Sal to “see the light”. The sense of appreciation for family and
community as displayed by the Mexicans in Jack Kerouac’s On the
Road is similarly expressed by Esteban and Esperanza, and many
other Latinos in Barbara Kingsolver’s The Bean Trees. As illegal
immigrants, many of these Latinos have had to tear away from
their families in their home countries in their attempts to chase
after the elusive American Dream. However, these illegal
immigrants are able to recreate a sense of family wherever they
are. Esteban and Esperanza, as well as the many other illegal
immigrants living atop Mattie’s shop live as though they are one
family (Kingsolver 194). This togetherness and camaraderie
enables them withstand the harsh realities of life as illegal
immigrants in the United States.
Esteban and Esperanza’s sense of family is expressed
powerfully in their agreement to act as Turtle’s parents so that
she is not taken away from Taylor (Kingsolver 245). Through this
act, Esteban and his wife show that they understand the
importance of family, and Esperanza cries genuinely when she is
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being prodded about being Turtle’s mother – an act that shows she
carries her identity as a mother in all contexts. Therefore,
ultimately, the portrayal of Latinos (Mexicans in the novel On the
Road and Guatemalans in the novel The Bean Trees) shows that they are
able to combine the normal endeavors of adult life with a keen
sense of fidelity to the family as an institution and entity that
confers security, peace and from which hope and love spring
eternal.
“Latino Hospitality” in Helena Viramonte’s Under the Feet of Jesus
More intricate similarities can be drawn between the
activities of the characters in Jack Kerouac’s On the Road and
Helena Maria Viramonte’s Under the Feet of Jesus. Both Sal in On the
Road and Alejo in Under the Feet of Jesus fall sick, and have to be
taken care of in their paths to recovery. As stated earlier, Sal
is aided to recovery by virtual strangers in a hospital in
Mexico, far away from his native America. Alejo too falls sick
and the simple exercise of taking him to a clinic or hospital
requires the physical and financial expenditure of nearly every
member of Estrella’s family and friends (Viramontes 102). While
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at the clinic, Alejo’s sickness turns out to be beyond the scope
of the clinic’s medical staff expertise, and the nurse directs
Estrella, her mother and her family to take him to a bigger
hospital. With no money to ensure that Alejo will gain admittance
at the hospital, Estrella and her family had the option of giving
up and leaving Alejo’s fate to the gods (Cooper 370). However,
Estrella and other members of her family do all within their
powers and beyond in order to ensure that Alejo is able to gain
admittance at the hospital they are referred to by the nurse.
They use threats of physical violence on the nurse, and
forcefully take the little money they had paid at the clinic in
order to utilize it in the hospital they would take Alejo
(Viramontes 112). This episode contrasts sharply with Sal’s
situation after he falls sick with dysentery and his supposed
friend Dean abandons him. In the end, his newly found friends see
him through his recovery. This portrayal of a keen sense of
altruism and devotion to friends as exhibited by the Mexicans in
Under the Feet of Jesus as well as On the Road indicates their
appreciation for family and community.
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Family, as stated earlier, confers a sense of security that
leads those raised within such a context to desire such a blanket
of love and appreciation wrapped around them throughout their
lives. In the novel On the Road Dean Moriarty seeks out his
vagabond father if only so that he can experience the sense of
family that he feels he has missed since his father walked out of
their home. The same is true for Sal Paradise insofar as desiring
the sense of belonging and love that a family (or being in a
marriage) confers is concerned. Although Sal has divorced his
wife and now seeks a life of ‘freedom’ and feels the need to
disassociate himself with any commitment in relationships, his
ultimate longing throughout his many travel is to find ‘the girl’
– the one lady that will make him happy and show him love for as
long as he lives. Perfecto in The Bean Trees similarly keeps longing
for a past where he lived with his wife and children in a loving
family setting. Therefore this longing for family betrays a
desire for all the above-mentioned characters to exist within a
loving social context of family and community, however much these
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characters may seek to deny the same, or wish to run from the
same.
Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty in the novel On the Road are in
search of some form of freedom which they believe will make their
lives better and assert their manhood in a unique way, different
from what the society expects of them. Sal is thus in a state of
continuous travel and movement, on different roads, in search of
a sense of freedom from responsibilities such as marriage or
long-term jobs. Dean Moriarty epitomizes a free spirited
character, and his love for partying, discovery and travel is as
powerful as his inability to establish long-lasting friendship
relationships with both men and women is unfortunate. Sal and
Dean wish to be ‘different’ to the norms in their contemporary
society.
However, even as they seek to assert their freedom in a
society that values commitment to relationships, family
responsibilities and fidelity to long-term careers and jobs, they
are unwittingly betraying their desire for the very things they
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proclaim to dislike. Both Sal and Dean desire a sense of
belonging and security; signaled by Sal’s desire for a girl to
love him unconditionally, and Dean’s obsession with finding his
father. The Mexicans with whom Sal and Dean interact display a
sense of family that inevitably leaves Sal admiring such a
context. The Latino characters in the novels Under the Feet of Jesus
and The Bean Trees show that family and friends stick with their own
through the toughest of times and in share in the laughs during
the good times. As shown, Sal and Dean seek such a sense of
unconditional love, and therefore the many travels that they
undertake are not so much an exercise in seeking freedom, but a
search for the sense of love and belonging that they wish to
experience.
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Works Cited
Bill, Roger. "Traveller Or Tourist? Jack Kerouac And The
Commodification Of Culture." Dialectical Anthropology 34.3
(2010): 395-417.
Cooper, Lydia R. "“Bone, Flesh, Feather, Fire”: Symbol As Freedom
In Helena Maria Viramontes's Under The Feet Of Jesus."
Critique 51.4 (2010): 366-377.
Foxe, Gladys. "And Nobody Knows What's Going To Happen To
Anybody": Fear And Futility In Jack Kerouac's On The Road
And Why It Is Important." Psychoanalytic Review 95.1 (2008): 45-
60.
Haslam, Jason. "“It Was My Dream That Screwed Up”: The Relativity
Of Transcendence In On The Road." Canadian Review Of American
Studies 39.4 (2009): 443-464.
Himmelwright, Catherine. "Gardens Of Auto Parts: Kingsolver's
Merger Of American Western Myth And Native American Myth In
"The Bean Trees.." Southern Literary Journal 39.2 (2007): 119-139.
Kerouac, Jack. On the Road. New York City, NY: Penguin Books, 1976.
Print.
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Kingsolver, Barbara. The Bean Trees. New York City, NY: HarperTorch,
1988. Print
Metz, Walter. "Down Kerouac's Road To Pixar's Up." Film Criticism
35.1 (2010): 60-81.
Mortenson, Erik R. "Beating Time: Configurations Of Temporality
In Jack Kerouac's On The Road." College Literature 28.3 (2001):
51-61.
Napelee, Dan. "On The Road: The Original Scroll; Or, We’Re Not
Queer, We’Re Just Beats." Explicator 69.2 (2011): 72-75.
Skinazi, Karen E.H. "Through Roots And Routes: On The Road’S
Portrayal Of An Outsider's Journey Into The Meaning Of
America." Canadian Review Of American Studies 39.1 (2009): 85-103.
Spangler, Jason. "We're On A Road To Nowhere: Steinbeck, Kerouac,
And The Legacy Of The Great Depression." Studies In The Novel
40.3 (2008): 308-327.
Viramontes, Helena. Under The Feet of Jesus. New York City, NY: Plume,
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