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Jim Fonseca's Reviews > The Dharma Bums
The Dharma Bums
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[Revised, pictures and shelves added 10/19/22]
Published in 1958, this book is a fascinating preview of the 1960s. Like On the Road, it is based on Kerouac's adventures in the late 1940s and early 1950s as he and his buddies helped create the counterculture. They migrated cross-country between bases in Greenwich Village and San Francisco. They hopped freights as hobos (at the end of that era).
Kerouac and buddies talk endlessly about Buddhist concepts including dharma of the title. One definition (of many) for this word is "cosmic law and order, as expressed by the teachings of the Buddha.� I should also say that none of these concepts are discussed in any depth in the book � they are just throw-aways.
Kerouac is credited with inventing the phrase ‘beat generation� but his group disowned it when the press turned it into the pejorative ‘beatnik,� precursor of flower children and hippies.
So, Jack and his buddies hang out in San Francisco, partying. You can always spot Jack at the party: he's the guy chugging from a jug of cheap wine, a precursor to his death from alcoholism in 1967. The group also occasionally goes backpacking. A good part of the book is an excellent stand-alone backpacking story.
This is a good story with good writing but there is an annoying "Oh gosh! Golly gee" aspect to the writing as if Jack were the world's biggest Eagle Scout, gone bad with the booze and the women.
To me it's fascinating to see this work as a precursor to the cultural revolution of the 1960s. Here in the late 1940s and early 1950s we have: Zen vs. materialism; haiku; criticism of suburban ‘TV zombie families;� revolt against the suburban lifestyle; hot tubs; love of nature and backpacking; buying your clothes at Goodwill; yogurt; free love; taking all your clothes off at parties (still hasn't quite caught on); cooking with mesquite; hibachis (remember those?), and, of course, jeans and guitars. Hard drugs weren't in yet, at least in Kerouac's crowd.
Top photo: Figaro Café in Greenwich Village, a ‘beatnik� hangout frequented by Kerouac from forbes.com
The author (1922-1969) from biography.com
Published in 1958, this book is a fascinating preview of the 1960s. Like On the Road, it is based on Kerouac's adventures in the late 1940s and early 1950s as he and his buddies helped create the counterculture. They migrated cross-country between bases in Greenwich Village and San Francisco. They hopped freights as hobos (at the end of that era).
Kerouac and buddies talk endlessly about Buddhist concepts including dharma of the title. One definition (of many) for this word is "cosmic law and order, as expressed by the teachings of the Buddha.� I should also say that none of these concepts are discussed in any depth in the book � they are just throw-aways.
Kerouac is credited with inventing the phrase ‘beat generation� but his group disowned it when the press turned it into the pejorative ‘beatnik,� precursor of flower children and hippies.
So, Jack and his buddies hang out in San Francisco, partying. You can always spot Jack at the party: he's the guy chugging from a jug of cheap wine, a precursor to his death from alcoholism in 1967. The group also occasionally goes backpacking. A good part of the book is an excellent stand-alone backpacking story.
This is a good story with good writing but there is an annoying "Oh gosh! Golly gee" aspect to the writing as if Jack were the world's biggest Eagle Scout, gone bad with the booze and the women.
To me it's fascinating to see this work as a precursor to the cultural revolution of the 1960s. Here in the late 1940s and early 1950s we have: Zen vs. materialism; haiku; criticism of suburban ‘TV zombie families;� revolt against the suburban lifestyle; hot tubs; love of nature and backpacking; buying your clothes at Goodwill; yogurt; free love; taking all your clothes off at parties (still hasn't quite caught on); cooking with mesquite; hibachis (remember those?), and, of course, jeans and guitars. Hard drugs weren't in yet, at least in Kerouac's crowd.
Top photo: Figaro Café in Greenwich Village, a ‘beatnik� hangout frequented by Kerouac from forbes.com
The author (1922-1969) from biography.com
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Reading Progress
February 24, 2012
–
Started Reading
February 26, 2012
–
Finished Reading
October 6, 2013
– Shelved
October 19, 2022
– Shelved as:
counterculture
October 19, 2022
– Shelved as:
american-authors
October 19, 2022
– Shelved as:
1950s
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Zoeytron
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Oct 19, 2022 05:05AM
Thanks for the hike down memory lane with your final paragraph. We still have a hibachi stored out in the garage, albeit covered in cobwebs. Enjoyed your review, Jim, as always.
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Zoeytron wrote: "Thanks for the hike down memory lane with your final paragraph. We still have a hibachi stored out in the garage, albeit covered in cobwebs. Enjoyed your review, Jim, as always."Thanks Zoeytron, I liked grilling with mesquite. I first heard of that in the 80s - thought it was a 'new thing.' My hibachi rusted away years ago.
Whether one likes his prose or his lifestyle, Kerouac was like an idea whose time had come & he helped to personify an anti-establishment statement in the midst of the button-down age of Eisenhower. Beyond that, there is often a special cadence to Kerouac's prose & it is parodied (by Garrison Keillor among others) almost as frequently as that of Hemingway or Faulkner, a continuing tribute to his originality. Bill
Quo wrote: "Whether one likes his prose or his lifestyle, Kerouac was like an idea whose time had come & he helped to personify an anti-establishment statement in the midst of the button-down age of Eisenhower..."You make some good points Bill. We should have a list of which authors created 'styles' that others later followed.
I also like your reference to the Ike era when TV shows like Leave It to Beaver helped create the ideal of the suburban single-family home lifestyle that Kerouac rebelled against. That has particular resonance with me because I grew up in a sea of New England 3-deckers tenements. My parents and none of my immediate relatives ever owned a home. When I watched Beaver, it was as if they lived on Mars. I remember telling a gf once in college that I had never been inside a single-family home until I was in high-school. And she said to me "Don't tell anybody that, it sounds stupid." LOL
Jim: Well beyond Hemingway, Faulkner & Kerouac, there are others whose writing style is parodied but not always effectively. For that matter, Graham Greene once entered a Graham Greene prose- style contest in the U.K. but he came in 2nd, or so the author claimed.With regard to Leave it to Beaver, there were other television shows that seemed more real, even if there audience was not as broad. Two that come to mind are The Goldbergs, about a relatively poor Jewish family living in the Bronx (or some place similar) and also I Remember Mama, detailing a Scandinavian-American family of rather simple means. In the latter, I seem to recall that each week they would pour out all the money that the family had tucked away in a coffee tin on the kitchen table, with each family member participating to make a collective decision about what they could afford to buy in the coming week. Both shows represented immigrant life in a very heart-warming way, causing the viewer to feel almost part of their lives. Bill
When I read this book back in the '80s, I enjoyed it so much more than On the Road.
I was in the Peace Corps at the time, living out of a backpack for big chunks of my life then...Bill, you were in the Peace Corps...did the novel speak to you too, back then?
My favourite Kerouac book, but it deals with the Beats of the 1950s, not the 1960s. The story takes place in 1955 (book:On the Road] was in the 1940s. The Beats did, in many ways, precede the hippies, which were their successors in the late 60s. Beatniks were not the same as the Beats -- they were groupies, hangers on, emulators, who orbited the Beats as the first artrificial satellites, sputniks, orbited the earth.
Quo wrote: "Jim: Well beyond Hemingway, Faulkner & Kerouac, there are others whose writing style is parodied but not always effectively. For that matter, Graham Greene once entered a Graham Greene prose- style..."I recall my mother watching I Remember Mama but don't recall seeing it myself, or the Goldbergs. Bill, you must recall as I do, old B&W round 10 inch TVs, rabbit ears and rooftop antennas. I also recall going with my father to a store with a paper bag of TV tubes that had to be tested.
Petergiaquinta wrote: "When I read this book back in the '80s, I enjoyed it so much more than On the Road."It's been so long since I read On the Road I would need to re-read it.
Stephen wrote: "My favourite Kerouac book, but it deals with the Beats of the 1950s, not the 1960s. The story takes place in 1955 (book:On the Road] was in the 1940s. The Beats did, in many ways, precede the hippi..."Stephen wrote: "My favourite Kerouac book, but it deals with the Beats of the 1950s, not the 1960s. The story takes place in 1955 (book:On the Road] was in the 1940s. The Beats did, in many ways, precede the hippi..."
Yes, published in 1958 so it's the 50's. I wonder how true it is that Kerouac came up with the phrase 'beat generation.' I must have read that in the Intro.
Jim wrote: "Quo wrote: "Jim: Well beyond Hemingway, Faulkner & Kerouac, there are others whose writing style is parodied but not always effectively. For that matter, Graham Greene once entered a Graham Greene ..."Bill did you see Comment #7 above addressed to you from Peter?
Peter: I've only read Kerouac's On The Road but have spent a bit of time at Gunther's in Northport, Long Island, the place where Kerouac lost countless brain cells, while living with his mother in that town. The place is now listed as a "dive bar", full of heavily-tattooed bikers but in days past used to trade on the fact that Kerouac once drank there, occasionally unable to find his way home. However if Dharma Bums had been in my Peace Corps book-locker (sent to every volunteer), I'd probably have found my way to the book ages ago. Bill
Jim wrote: "Stephen wrote: "My favourite Kerouac book, but it deals with the Beats of the 1950s, not the 1960s. The story takes place in 1955 (book:On the Road] was in the 1940s. The Beats did, in many ways, p..."I've read in various places that Kerouac came up with the phrase "beat generation". In the original context it was in the sense of "beaten down, defeated", but it later acquired a second meaning, of a beatific vision.
My guess is that it had at least something to do with Jazz idioms as Kerouac was very tuned in to what Jazz seemed to express.
"Hard drugs weren't in yet, at least in Kerouac's crowd." Oh my sweet innocent child. You are so wrong. See: Junkie by William Burroughs.
Quo wrote: "My guess is that it had at least something to do with Jazz idioms as Kerouac was very tuned in to what Jazz seemed to express."Could be Bill - just found this comment
Taye wrote: ""Hard drugs weren't in yet, at least in Kerouac's crowd." Oh my sweet innocent child. You are so wrong. See: Junkie by William Burroughs."Hi Taye, I guess I should revise it and say hard drugs aren't mentioned in the book. (I don't recall them being mentioned.) Yes Burroughs was a big addict, starting on morphine. But if Kerouac experimented (as he probably did), from what I've read he was addicted only to alcohol and Benzedrine, which, since it was over the counter, I didn't think of as a hard drug.
Taye wrote: ""Hard drugs weren't in yet, at least in Kerouac's crowd." Oh my sweet innocent child. You are so wrong. See: Junkie by William Burroughs."Was William Burroughs part of Kerouac's "crowd"?
Yes, Kerouac and others of his crowd visited Burroughs, but I don't think he was part of it, more a kind of legendary figure.
Stephen wrote: "Taye wrote: ""Hard drugs weren't in yet, at least in Kerouac's crowd." Oh my sweet innocent child. You are so wrong. See: Junkie by William Burroughs."Was William Burroughs part of Kerouac's "cro..."
If I recall correctly, Kerouac visited him in New Orleans but that was it in the book.
Stephen wrote: "Taye wrote: ""Hard drugs weren't in yet, at least in Kerouac's crowd." Oh my sweet innocent child. You are so wrong. See: Junkie by William Burroughs."Was William Burroughs part of Kerouac's "cro..."
And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks
They wrote this book together.
Bernard wrote: "Stephen wrote: "Taye wrote: ""Hard drugs weren't in yet, at least in Kerouac's crowd." Oh my sweet innocent child. You are so wrong. See: Junkie by William Burroughs."Was William Burroughs part o..."
And there's more. Kerouac, Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg were all at Columbia. A guy named Lucien Carr introduced them to each other. Carr was later involved in a murder and Kerouac and Burroughs helped him dispose of the body. GR won't let me post outside weblinks in Comments but you can search the many articles on the web. The victim's name was David Kammerer.
I remember well the hibachi, Jim. What a trip back in time. Or should I say, what a trip, man!
David wrote: "I remember well the hibachi, Jim. What a trip back in time. Or should I say, what a trip, man!"Mine rusted out in the 70s!
