On The Road- Question 1

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.

I wasn't exactly sure what this question meant with the use of the words 'reliable' and 'unreliable'. Is it asking if Sal did an adequate job as narrator? If he provided good enough information for the reader to travel along in the story smoothly? In this case, I think that he was a reliable and good narrator. He provided external information about what was going on, as well as internal information about what was happening in his mind and how he felt about all the events that were taking place. (I sometimes wish he had provided more of how he was feeling in some places, especially times when Dean was being unreliable.) One thing in particular I liked about this book were the character descriptions. There were a lot of characters in this book and I had a difficult time keeping track of what everyone looked like in my head, but I was always excited when a new name was mentioned.

"Chad is a slim blonde boy with a strange witch-doctor face that goes with his interest in anthropology and prehistory indians. His nose breaks softly and almost creamily under a golden flare of hair; he has the beauty and grace of a Western hotshot who's danced in roadhouses and played a little football." (P.36)

I believe there are others that offer less of a physical description, but I love how personal, unusual, and not all that helpful of a description these are. This way, it makes the story feel like it's something being told to you personally instead of something written in a book.