Jack Kerouac had a native genius for language
that I think was, tragically, obscured by the writer's urge to embrace
experience in a hurry. In a hurry he was, influenced by both the elusive notion
of Zen to be in the moment (or better, be the moment) and the zipping
virtuosity of Charlie Parker and Bud Powell's jazz improvisations.
Up tempo,
crazy fast, instant configurations of genius adding up to a pulsing , nerve
rattling kind of genius, these elements inspired Kerouac, but even at these
speeds his heroes, both musicians, writers and even Zen masters, were required
to take their time and learn the dictates of their disciplines; Parker's or
Coltrane's or James' fluidity and near perfection of instant creation are the
result of endless hours of practice and learning to go beyond one's habit of
relying on easy conclusions, tired tropes or fussy, pretentious,
hyperventilated phrase making and considering the sound, the effect, the
expressiveness of the words their putting together.
One learns, hopefully, to
be elegant, poetic and original with alacrity. Jack Kerouac could indeed be
moving and genuinely beautiful in what he wrote, but these moments are
exceptions--there is such a need in virtually all his work to make experience
more vivid, more real with overwriting that
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