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Chapter 8 - Vanity of Duluoz and the 1960s

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 October 2024

By
David Stephen Calonne
Edited by
Steven Belletto
Steven Belletto
Affiliation:
Lafayette College, Pennsylvania
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Summary

This chapter focuses on Kerouac’s last major novel, Vanity of Duluoz in the context of the 1960s. This novel was composed under fraught conditions as Kerouac labored under intense financial pressure to earn money to pay for his mother’s debilitating illnesses. Not only was it a struggle for Kerouac to complete it, the novel also powerfully documents Kerouac’s struggle with reconciling his traditional, “conservative” upbringing with the nascent “Beat” rebellious energies – born in the forties and continuing into the sixties – a conflict which this chapter explores.

Keywords

Kerouac, JackVanity of Duluoz1960spoliticsconservatismsocial attitudesalcoholismLowell, MAFranco-American
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Companion to Jack Kerouac , pp. 110 - 122
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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