August Books 10) On The Road, by Jack Kerouac

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A book with hidden shallows, I felt. The narrator, Sal, tells us of his affection for and inspiration by his friend Dean Moriarty, and expects us to admire Dean’s exploitation of friends, relatives and women to maintain his transient, commitment-free lifestyle. I couldn’t bring myself to do so. The book’s defenders make claims that it tracks a mystical, religious journey; the journey I will agree to, but I saw no encouraging signs of spiritual growth. Each new destination seems much the same as the others: different boozing partners, different girls, but no big difference. The style is indeed entertaining and engaging, but I felt at the end that this short book was probably three times too long.

One thought on “August Books 10) On The Road, by Jack Kerouac”

  1. Spilling down to Lisburn isn’t necessary. Splitting Newtownabbey two ways, with most of it going to North Belfast, and the remaining 8 wards (Ballyclare DEA, Jordanstown, Monkstown and Rostulla) to East Antrim. Calling a seat based on Antrim and Ballymena “South Antrim” seems dubious to me incidentally. Calling it after the two main towns, since they are easily the focal points, seems best.

    The Newtownabbey extension to North Belfast also leads to a number of what for me were more desirable overall outcomes:

    1) Carnlough stays in East Antrim.
    2) West Belfast remains intact with the result that you have a constituency that more of the residents would identify with. It’s very doubtful that anyone on the Falls regards themselves as living in South West Belfast. The Shankill not only stays in West Belfast, but gets united for the first time.
    3) Most of South Belfast remains together,getting merged with East Belfast, rather than divided.
    4) As a knock on effect, Ballynahinch returns to South Down. It always seemed to me that its links with Down Council were stronger than any with Newtownards.

    Under such unnecessarily restrictive criteria that seemed to me the best of a bad job. The Commission should either have to review boundaries every 5 years or produce seats within 5% but having to do both seems like overkill.

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