Jack Kerouac

The Literary Exploration of Kerouac
"With the coming of Dean Moriarty began the part of my life you could call my life on the Road"(Kerouac 1). That was a quote from Jack Kerouac's book On The Road. His life on the road referred to in the novel On The Road   is also referring to   Jack Kerouac's quest in life to find the true purpose for living and a new lifestyle. Jack Kerouac's works were certainly an important part of American literature (Novels 193; Goldstein 61).
Jack Kerouac's date of birth was March 12, 1922. He originally lived in Lowell, Massachusetts. Jack Kerouac's ancestry was French-Canadian. When his family was together, they spoke a French-Canadian language called Joual. Kerouac was often called TiJean, which meant Petite Jean. He was the youngest of two other children. One of his brothers, named Gerard, died when Jack was 5 from rheumatic fever (Peterson 15, Jack 1).
Jack went to St. Louis French Parochial School when he was at the age of six. A priest named Morissette suggested to Kerouac to get an athletic scholarship and go to a College in New York City if he wanted to become a writer. Using his football scholarship, his high school was Horace Mann School for Boys. He was too poor to go to his graduation, so he had to stand out of the building and hear what he could. Also using his football scholarship, he attended Columbia University. He broke his leg in the first football season while playing. He wasn't permitted to play during his second season, and he left Columbia University. He was a seaman for a while, and he used his earnings from that to go back to Columbia University. He left the University again and returned to Lowell after that in a short period of time (Peterson 15).
In March 1943, he did not pass a medical test to become a Naval Pilot. He tried some Naval training though, and he did not like it. He was honorably discharged later because of his "indifferent character" (Peterson 15-16).
After he took another seaman trip, he had... [continues]

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