"On the Road" by Jack Kerouac?

Question

how is this novel a "novel of its time" (as opposed to Alice Walker's "the Color Purple" being a "timeless" novel?)

please leave deatails & evidence from the text

thanks in advance! =D

Answer 1

I'd argue a lot of it is timeless, as pretty  much any 20 year old who reads it can sympathize with the restless urge to go, travel, be.  Also any thirty-five year old can recognize the bitter sweet nostalgia for the time of life when you can hit the road.

But here is what you want.  A lot of the novel concerns itself with the idea that WW2 changed the world and the restless rootless people concerned for good times, bop, and wild drug rampages were a product of that time.  That they'd become unmoored from the 9-5 world.  Of course this is BS, as you can find the same themes in Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Henry Miller when they write about  the post WWI "lost generation."

The novel does depict a certain time in America, a time when homosexuality was hidden, drugs were a fringe activity, and even straight s*x rarely discussed in print.  It tells of a small circle of writers, who would end up as well known for their personal lives as they were for their writing.

I still say the idea is bunk, as the beautiful prose of this book is timeless, the restless characters verge on classic archetypes, and the book is perpetually discovered by new hedonists and travelers, fresh from the structure of school and work who dream of seeing

"the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,

dragging themselves through the ***** streets at dawn looking for an angry fix;

Angel-headed hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection

to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night.  "

Answer 2

It captures beatnik culture that was slightly popular for a very short period of time. It's not really relevant to people today in the sense that the beatnik lifestyle doesn't exist anymore.