(On The Road by Jack Kerouac ) Question # 3 :

I believe that Allen Ginsberg wrote that letter to Kerouac because, he was scared of what people would think about the novel On the Road by Jack Kerouac. I believe he didn't want people to see a society such as the one Kerouac depicted, a real society. Ginsberg wanted people to probably think of the society in the 40's - 50's as the one shown in movies now a days, truthfully the only one I knew of. On the back of the novel it was even said On The Road, "The novel that defined a generation." Basically underneath all of the sex, drinking, and traveling, you see a bunch of lost broken hearted people waiting for the moment when they just can stop and relax. But they're too caught up, hence Sal and Dean and the rest of their friends.

On page 58, Kerouac really made me step back when he said, "Boys and girls in America have such a sad time together; sophistication demands that they submit to sex immediately without a proper preliminary talk (On The Road, 58)." After reading on in the novel you sit back and believe this is true in that society, every where you turn a girl is giving it up to some random guy they don't even know. Or that even that a man and a woman could talk no more than one day and assume they are in love and want to get married. Kerouac makes you feel sorry for the people of this past generation and just makes you wonder where their morals went.

When you think about it newer generations are built up off of the past, so is what was going on back then, being done today? I still feel that Ginsberg didn't want people to read anything like this, hence sending that letter to Kerouac. I commend Kerouac for publishing this novel, because it gives you the REAL picture, for people who don't know (like myself), need to have knowledge about. I say this because, generations like the one in On The Road sets the grounds, for how generations to come would grow and be defined.

PS. Sorry if there is anything wrong, I did this from my phone.