Jack Kerouac: Meet the Beat

Despite living only for 47 years, Jack Kerouac was one of the most influential American novelists and poets of the 20^th century. He was a pioneer of the Beat Generation, a movement focused on exploring American culture and politics post-WWII. Through the Beat culture, he, along with others like Allen Ginsberg or William S. Burroughs, focused on various topics like the rejection of economic materialism, portraying the human condition, experimenting with psychedelic drugs, rejecting standard narrative values, and so on.

Things you should know about Jack Kerouac

· He was born on the 12^th of March, 1922, in Lowell, which is a mill town in the Massachusetts area.

· His first novel was “The Town and the City,” published in 1950, which was not very successful. However, success came with “On the Road,” which he wrote the next year. He typed that on a 120-foot scroll of tracing paper, as he wanted to continue writing and not be interrupted. That novel became the starting point of the Beat Generation, alongside work from other authors.

· Aside from that novel, Jack Kerouac wrote many others, with “The Dharma Burns,” “Big Sur,” and “Desolation Agents” being prime examples.

· Despite the fact that Jack Kerouac is mostly known for his novels, he also wrote poetry. “Mexico City Blues” is considered to be his best poetry work. His poetry mirrored the prose style he used, and that’s deeply personal, improvisational, but also unpunctuated.

· Although he had a lot of literary success, Jack Kerouac had his fair share of struggles with fame, along with personal demons. He turned to alcohol, seeing it as a way of escapism, which led to his health deteriorating during the 1960s. That ultimately led to him passing away on the 21^st of October, 1969, due to cirrhosis.

Jack Kerouac’s legacy

Although he had various struggles in his life, Jack Kerouac remains a hero to many people. His innovative writing style, unique focus on honesty, and highlighting what’s wrong with society made him a great person to look up to for years to come. Additionally, his archives, filled with unpublished work, journals, and letters, have offered scholars a great insight into his ambitions, focus, and creativity, beyond what was released to the public. What’s even more interesting, his original scroll manuscript for “On the Road” sold for $2.43 million at an auction.

We created this amazing artwork for our Jack Kerouac shirt because we wanted to highlight his struggles and how difficult it was for him to sustain himself during the early days of his career. He had to work as a railroad lineman and used a lantern to walk the tracks at night. We decided to incorporate that unique element into his shirt while also highlighting a very important quote from him: “All life is but a skull-bones and a rack of ribs through which we keep passing food and fuel just so we can burn so furiously beautiful.”

If you want to support Kerouac’s legacy and also showcase him as one of your favorite writers, we highly recommend checking out our Jack Kerouac shirt today. It features original artwork, a beautiful visual style, and it truly encapsulates the essence of Kerouac while also sharing one of his quotes and great details about his life!