Rethinking Kerouac - by Erik Mortenson & Tomasz Sawczuk (Hardcover)

About the Book

"Esteemed Beat commentators examine Kerouac's classic works, like On the Road, alongside more obscure ones; they bring to light new facets of Kerouac's life and work, including his excursions into painting, poetry and non-fiction; they provide a rethinking of how important issues of race, gender relations, populist rhetoric, religion and queerness inform his work and reception; and they reexamine the ongoing cultural reworking of Kerouac in popular music, literature and online. Through varied perspectives, this collecton provides an indispensable account of the continued relevance of both Kerouac the writer and Kerouac the cultural icon in the 21st century"--

Book Synopsis

This long overdue reevaluation of Jack Kerouac gives fresh perspectives on his unique literary output, his vexed relation to issues of race, class, and gender, as well as his continuing cultural afterlife.

This collection of essays by esteemed Beat commentators reassesses one of the 20th century's most emblematic but often misunderstood American writers. Despite amassing a substantial body of influential work and becoming a recognizable icon globally, Kerouac has often suffered critical neglect, and this volume seeks to offer a range of fresh perspectives on his unique artistic output as well as his continuing cultural afterlife.

Through an examination of classic texts like On the Road to more obscure ones like Pic, these essays recalibrate our understanding of the writer by placing his creative output into dialogue with current cultural issues to provide a rethinking of how concerns such as race, gender relations, artificial intelligence, populist rhetoric, and queerness inform his work and its contemporary reception. These essays also examine how the peculiarities of global circulation and social media influence the ongoing cultural appropriation of Kerouac in popular music, literature, and online.

Through these varied approaches, Rethinking Kerouac: Afterlives, Continuities, Reappraisalsprovides an indispensable account of the continued relevance of both Kerouac the writer and Kerouac the cultural icon in the 21st century.

Review Quotes

Coming as it does in the wake of the Kerouac centenary, the essays gathered here remind us of the immense, ongoing, and indelible importance Jack Kerouac continues to have on global literature and culture. Rethinking Kerouac is both a celebration of Kerouac's many achievements as a writer and a reckoning with his status as exemplar of what the editors call "the problematics of mid-century culture." As such, it is a timely occasion for readers to rethink and reassess Kerouac's ever-evolving legacy alongside contributions by seasoned and emergent voices in Kerouac Studies.
Jean-Christophe Cloutier, Associate Professor of English & Comparative Literature, University of Pennsylvania, USA

Moving beyond hagiographic portraits of the reluctant 'King of the Beats, ' this fresh volume of essays grounds Kerouac in the shifting political and cultural background of mid-20th century America. The essays grapple with the writer's inconsistencies and lay bare some of the recalcitrant myths about the writer and his work.
Douglas Field, Professor of American Literature, University of Manchester, UK

So much has been written about Kerouac by so many scholars that it sometimes feels there is nothing left to say, but this wonderful collection provides many new interpretations, including studies of his lesser-known efforts in screenwriting and his influence on musicians. It is a much-needed critical reappraisal of a complex figure and his divisive work.
David S. Wills, Editor of Beatdom Literary Journal

About the Author

Erik Mortenson is a Faculty Member in English at Lake Michigan College in Benton Harbor, Michigan. Mortenson has published numerous journal articles and book chapters, as well as several books, including Capturing the Beat Moment: Cultural Politics and the Poetics of Presence (2011), which won a CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title award; Ambiguous Borderlands: Shadow Imagery in Cold War American Culture (2016); and Translating the Counterculture: The Reception of the Beats in Turkey (2018). He has also published The Beats and the Academy: A Renegotiation (2023), co-edited with Tony Trigilio, along with the memoir Kick Out the Bottom (2023), co-written with Christopher Kramer. Mortenson is also a translator whose work has appeared in journals such as Asymptote, Talisman, and Two Lines.

Tomasz Sawczuk is Assistant Professor at University of Bialystok, Poland. In 2022 he was a Visiting Research Scholar at Fordham University, USA. Among his publications on Beat writers, film and popular culture are On the Road to Lost Fathers: Jack Kerouac in a Lacanian Perspective (2019) and a chapter contribution to The Routledge Handbook of International Beat Literature (2018). He also co-edited Visuality and Vision in American Literature (2014).