Blues Notes Can Also Sing In The Key Of Poetry

Many of his fans may not realize it, but Jack Kerouac was also an accomplished poet. Even though On The Road would later become a commericial success, fame and recognition would come late in the life of Jack Kerouac. At times, his prose did seem to flow to the music of poetry, so it should not be too surprising that editors would eventually discover his poetry. Many of these poems were found forgotten in the pages of old notebooks, or tucked away silently between the pages of his novels. Once collected these poems form a varied collection proving that Kerouac was more than a one hit wonder when it came to the art and craft of writing, and that he had a gift for turning words into the craft of poetry. Kerouac had definitely found his muse, but like his writing, his poetry would take some interesting twists and turns. Never content to stay within the safe confines of traditional writing, Kerouac refused to take the easy way out and only produce writing that would sell, and that was already accepted by the mainstream publishing industry. By experimenting with new word forms, the use of free verse meter, and creating imagery that show pictures of the real world of the streets of America, Kerouac was able to explore new themes in an experimental way. The beauty of his poetry cannot only be found in the new techniques that he used to create his poetry, but also in the places and people that he wrote about in those poems. A writer for the common man, he often saw a world that many mainstream authors neglected to see. Displaying the strengths of a naturalist writer, Kerouac saw the world as it was, and was able to break through the cynicism that surrounded it, and describe that world through the magic of freeverse prose and poetry.

While glancing out of the window of an old greyhound, he would see the true America as it existed in the fifties, and place that world onto the pages of the written word. The myth of Kerouac is that he wrote his books in three or four day sittings, spinning his novels out in rapid fire fashion. He even hinted at times that he was given a gift inspired by the muse, and did not really have to work hours upon hours as many of his contemporaries. He describes a world of parties, intellectual conversations, mad love affairs, and endless traveling. Upon close examination, however, the careful reader soon finds that this myth was far from the real Kerouac. As his old notebooks prove, he was

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