On The Road (Post 1)

On the Road, while classified as fiction, is a loosely autobiographical account of the "Beatnik" writers' travels across America--narrated by Sal Paradise (AKA Kerouac).
What is your impression of Sal as a narrator? Reliable? Unreliable? Explain and cite the text for support.


From reading up to part three so far in On The Road, Sal Paridse is unorthodox narrator. He is mainly focused on cramming in every finite detail of his travels so that there is only one picture to see. He does not attempt to let your imagination flow in comparison to McCarthy's 'The Road'. Instead he uses his massive vocabulary and intricate figurative language. From the reading, so far I am fully engaged and cannot get enough of this, 'lyrical language' that Kerouac uses; it just flows and it never seems to stop. At first I thought Sal was just rambling about arbitrary events and never seemed to get to the point. However, from reading more closely, that was his writing style. His stories lead to other stories and so on. I have sort of become accustomed to having his stories drag out. At times, yes Sal does put in an excessive amount of details but other times you need this. His lack of proper sentence structure and having really extensive run-on sentences only adds to the essence of his writing.He meets people for the first time and only describes their physical features; as his travels go on he later comes back to describe their personalities. An example of Sal's great narrating skills are in play when he talks about his stay with Remi and Lee Ann in Frisco. " A pain stabbed my heart, as it did every time I saw a girl I loved who was going the opposite direction in this too-big world." (81) Initially I believed this statement to be very true; but i think Kerouac wanted us to be critical thinkers here and really dig deep. I believe this statement was made to have the reader ask ones self, is the world really big. Because in fact he saw this bus with a beautiful women seated on it, only dreaming of meeting her until it came true. So I think what Kerouac was trying to say here is dont quit on your dream before a miracle happens. And it is not just with Teresa that he would meet again; Lucille he would meet again when he traveled back from Virginia. So I would not say that the world is big. I believe that a person can either be optimistic about the world and feel they will eventually meet someone again or be secluded. In my opinion the separation from everyone else in the world only makes the world seem bigger. Depending on what type of person you are the size of the world is all relative.