Jack Kerouac - On The Road

McCluahan? I don't know squat about him, but I do know that the media is the message.

It was just a theory on ratios of change, Patio...and the fact that we invent and then the inventions control us.

Don't remember Annie Hall. The only movie that Woody Allen ever made that I understond was Picking up the Pieces

<Fellow Canadian, of course I know him>

big deep sigh of relief.

About "On the Road", Truman Capote said "That's not writing, that's typing."

I think it's worth reading for the sense of how ahead of his time he was.

You might want to check out Capote-- Especially "Other Voices, Other Rooms", and "In Cold Blood".

Ah, yes, Gala. In Cold Blood. Capote called it a non fiction novel.

Yes, Letty. The poofy term for it is "literary non-fiction".

Rick, you may also want to check out the raucous Hunter Thompson novel "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas".

Desolation Angels was in my mind Kerouac's best book, the only one I read twice. Some of his books are not that good (Capote: "That's not writing. That's typing.")

I made a 'small' list of the authors and titles you proposed I should read:

Jack Kerouac - The Subterraneans, Dr. Sax, and Desolation Angels; Walt Whitman - Leaves Of Grass; William Faulkner - As I Lay Dying; Henry Miller; Charles Bukowski; Edmund Wilson - Memoirs Of Hecate County; Ernest Hemingway (wasn't he an American WW I soldier who wrote about his experiences?); Ken Kesey - One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest (great movie, Jack Nicholson is really good!), The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test, and Once Upon A Time A Great Notion (according to patiodog); Richard Brautigan - Trout Fishing In America; Capote - Other Voices, Other Rooms, and In Cold Blood; Hunter Thompson - Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas; and Ferlinghetti (and Allen Ginsberg?) as a must-read poet.

Personally I know I should add John Steinbeck (right?), he was mentioned in our Literature classes but I didn't read one of his books, friends of mine did and said Grapes Of Wrath was a really good book.

Yesterday evening and this morning (it's already past 11 AM here) I read already some parts of On The Road, and I have to say I like what I'm reading; while reading, the book gives me a sort of urge for freedom, to walk out the door and travel the world. But than again, those were the 40's, 50's.

Grapes of Wrath is on my list of all-time favorites.

Just to clarify one thing, Rick: "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test" is actually a book by Tom Wolfe about Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters. The Pranksters were an odd band of misfits (which briefly included Kerouac's old idol and, it seems, closety crush) who were a big part of the 60s acid culture. They had a spread of land in the hills south of San Francisco and romped around the country in a big painted bus. They were sort of at the vanguard of the hippie thing, except that they were funny.

Kesey, I think, was in a bit of a philosophical war with dour acid guru Timothy Leary.

Thanks patiodog for clearing that up.

Thanks for that patiodog, I wasn't clear in my post that it wasn't by Kesey. It's a lot more entertaining than Bonfire of the Vanities though.

Yeah, I was surprised when I came across it on my parents' shelf years ago. "Tom Wolfe?" I thought. But it's a very entertaining book. (I was going to Dead shows at the time, so it was also relevant...)

Grapes of Wrath, Edgar, i agree.

cavfancier ... has .... changed ... his .... avatar

Rick, it's temporary, in response to this thread: http://www.able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=29630&highlight= All will be well by tomorrow, I assure you.

I mean cavfancier = eating **** (hmmm that didn't sound as good as I thought it would); anyway, Ronald McDonald does fit you better. Oh well.

Ill be back to my normal avatar by the end of the day. I just thought gustav's thread was hilarious, and wanted to play along.

I understand cavfancier.