East Coast Beats and Jack Kerouac Summary

The book begins with a short introduction to the historical background of the Beat Generation written by editor Ann Charters. Charters writes that the Beat Generation started off as a very small literary movement in New York City, originally centered around Times Square. The Beats experiment with crime and drugs in an attempt to get outside of post-war American society, which the Beats see as fundamentally sick. The most important literary statement of the Beat Generation is Jack Kerouac's "On the Road," which renounces the cynicism of American intellectual life.

Charters begins the section on Jack Kerouac by giving some biographical information on Kerouac and explaining Kerouac's major works.

The excerpt from "On the Road" begins with Kerouac describing his first meeting with Neal Cassady known as Dean Moriarty in the book. Kerouac...