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Jack Kerouac

Jack Kerouac Quotes

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Famous Jack Kerouac Quotes

“I'm stuck struggling in the cold water, and all I can do is grieve, grieve, in the hoar necessitous horror of the morning, bitterly I hate myself, bitterly it's too late yet while I feel better I still feel ephemeral and unreal and unable to straighten my thoughts or even really grieve, in fact I feel too stupid to be really bitter, in short I don't know what I'm doing and I'm being told what to do.”

KnowsFeelsStillsI CanFactsHateWaterCan DoMorningStruggleStupidColdHorrorLateI HateStuckBitterGrievingToo LateFeel BetterMy ThoughtsUnrealEphemeralCold WaterHate MyselfI Hate Myself
Book:Desolation Angels
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“But they need to worry and betray time with urgencies false and otherwise, purely anxious and whiny, their souls really won't be at peace unless they can latch to an established and proven worry and having once found it they assume facial expressions to fit and go with it, which is, you see, unhappiness, and all the time it all flies by them and they know it and that too worries them no end.”

KnowsNeedsSoulEndsFoundWorryExpressionFitAssumingUnhappinessAnxiousBetrayProvenUrgencyFacialFacial ExpressionLatches
Book:On the Road
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“Way far back in the beginning of the world was the whirlwind warning that we could all be blown away like chips and cry- Men with tired eyes realize it now, and wait to deform and decay- with maybe they have the power of love yet in their hearts just the same, I just don't know what that word means anymore- All I want is an ice cream cone”

KnowsMenWorldWayWantHeartMeanEyeWaitingRealizingCryTiredIceBoredWarningDecayCreamIce CreamChipsPower Of LoveWhirlwindBlown AwayConesIce Cream ConesTired Eyes
Author:Jack Kerouac
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“The bartenders are the regular band of Jack, and the heavenly drummer who looks up to the sky with blue eyes, with a beard, is wailing beer-caps of bottles and jamming on the cash register and everything is going to the beat - It's the beat generation, its béat, it's the beat to keep, it's the beat of the heart, it's being beat and down in the world and like oldtime lowdown.”

WorldLooksHeartEyeGenerationsSkyBandBeatsBlueBeerLook UpHeavenlyBottlesCashBeardCapsDrummerRegisterBlue EyesBartenderWailingBeat Generation
Book:Desolation Angels
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“Her little shoulders drove me mad; I hugged her and hugged her. And she loved it. 'I love love,' she said, closing her eyes. I promised her beautiful love. I gloated over her. Our stories were told; we subsided into silence and sweet anticipatory thoughts. It was as simple as that. You could have all your Peaches and Bettys and Marylous and Ritas and Camilles and Inezes in this world; this was my girl and my kind of girlsoul, and I told her that.”

WorldKindLittlesSaidStoriesEyeBeautifulGirlSimpleSilenceThis WorldSweetMadShouldersHer EyesClosingPeachesMy GirlBeautiful LoveCamille
Author:Jack Kerouac
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“Now the mountains were getting that pink tinge, I mean the rocks, they were just solid rock covered with the atoms of dust accumulated there since beginningless time. In fact I was afraid of those jagged monstrosities all around and over our heads. "They're so silent!" I said. "Yeah man, you know to me a mountain is a Buddha. Think of the patience, hundreds of thousands of years just sitting there bein perfectly perfectly silent and like praying for all living creatures in that silence and just waitin for us to stop all our frettin and foolin.”

ThinkingKnowsMenYearsMeanSaidFactsSilenceRocksPrayingMountainCreaturesSittingYeahSilentDustCoveredAtomsLiving CreaturesMonstrosity
Book:Road Novels 1957-1960
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“I nudged myself closer to the ledge and closed my eyes and thought 'Oh what a life this is, why do we have to be born in the first place, and only so we can have our poor gentle flesh laid out to such impossible horrors as huge mountains and rock and empty space,' and with horror I remembered the famous Zen saying, 'When you get to the top of a mountain, keep climbing.' The saying made my hair stand on end; it had been such cute poetry sitting on Alvah's straw mats.”

FirstsMadeEndsEyeBornSpacePoorImpossibleRocksHugeHairHorrorMountainSittingEmptyFleshGentleRememberedCuteClimbingStrawsEmpty SpaceLedges
Author:Jack Kerouac
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“Dharma Bums refusing to subscribe to the general demand that they consume production and therefore have to work for the privilege of consuming, all that cramp they didn't really want anyway such as refrigerators, TV sets, cars, at least new fancy cars, certain hair oils and deodorants and general junk you finally always see a week later in the garbage anyway, all of them imprisoned in a system of work, produce, consume, work, produce, consume.”

WantCertainWeekCarProduceTvsHairDemandPrivilegeProductionsOilFancyGarbageConsumingJunkDharmaRefrigeratorsCrampsDeodorantDharma BumsFancy Cars
Author:Jack Kerouac
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“I am writing this book because we're all going to die - In the loneliness of my own life, my father dead, my brother dead, my mother faraway, my sister and my wife far away, nothing here but my own tragic hands that once were guarded by a world, a sweet attention, that now are left to guide and disappear their own way into the common dark of all our deaths, sleeping in me raw bed, alone and stupid: with just this one pride and consolation: my broke heart in the general despair and opened up inwards to the Lord, I made a supplication in this dream”

WorldWayWritingHeartMadeBookDreamHandsMotherDiesFatherLeftDarkMy OwnSleepCommonAttentionLordWifeLonelinessStupidSweetBrotherPrideBedDespairMy WifeDisappearGuidesBrokeMy BrotherTragicMy SisterFar AwayConsolationMy Own LifeGuardedHeart BrokeSleeping InSupplication
Book:Visions of Cody
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“The secret of this kind of climbing, is like Zen. Don't think. Just dance along. It's the easiest thing in the world, actually easier than walking on flat ground which is monotonous. The cute little problems present themselves at each step and yet you don't hesitate and you find yourself on some other boulder you picked out for no special reason at all, just like zen.~ Japhy”

ThinkingWorldKindLittlesReasonProblemSecretStepsSpecialWalkingEasierCuteFinding YourselfFlatsClimbingMonotonousJust DanceBoulders
Book:Road Novels 1957-1960
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“All I wanted and all Neal wanted and all anybody wanted was some kind of penetration into the heart of things where, like in a womb, we could curl up and sleep the ecstatic sleep that Burroughs was experiencing with a good big mainline shot of M. and advertising executives in NY were experiencing with twelve Scotch & Sodas in Stouffers before they made the drunkard's train to Westchester---but without hangovers.”

HeartKindMadeBigsWantedSleepShotsTrainAdvertisingExecutivesTwelveWombEcstaticCurlsHangoverScotchSodaDrunkardsPenetrationBurroughs
Author:Jack Kerouac
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“I felt the sensation of each of the directions I mentally and emotionally turned into amazed at all the possible directions you can take with different motives that come in like it can make you a different person — I’ve often thought of this since childhood of suppose instead of going up Columbus as I usually did I’d turn into Filbert would something happen that at the time is insignificant enough but would be like enough to influence my whole life in the end? — What’s in store for me in the direction I don’t take?”

PersonsDifferentEndsEnoughWholeHappensWould BeTurnsFeltInfluenceChildhoodStoresWhole LifeMotiveSensationsAmazedInsignificantColumbus
Author:Jack Kerouac
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