Reviews - Sulla strada | The StoryGraph

4.46k reviews for:

Sulla strada

Jack Kerouac

3.28 AVERAGE

gingerrvgers's review

3.25

adventurous reflective slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

rm_rf's review against another edition

1.5

adventurous sad slow-paced

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

eenuttings's review against another edition

3.5

adventurous funny inspiring lighthearted medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

this is very much a worthwhile read, if more for the value of understanding its historical and cultural place and contributions to literature than for anything else. i think enough ink has been spilled on the contents of the book, the wreckage of the beat generation, the fatal individualism of the movement and the hippy movement that proceeded it, etc. everyone, at this point, i think gets that dean and sal are both shitty self-absorbed people and the romance of the adventure here is mostly born from the natural romance of being in your 20's, doing dumb shit without caring about others, and feeling everything both very deeply and very transiently. but it really helps to contextualize all of that to actually, you know, finally read the thing. the prose is surprisingly good here, i'd say better than any of the actual content, which i wasn't expecting. i was down on it at first but especially as you get later on it does become something rather special, perhaps because kerouac basically stole much of what's good about his style from cassady (dean) in his letters. but when it shines it really shines, there are passages where this fast-paces stream of consciousness style really shines, with all the words spilling out one after another, rolling and building and carrying the reader along, crescendoing into fantastically vivid imagery and emotion. reading it for the first time, i could see a lot of pynchon, who was clearly very influenced by the style of the beats. though of course, pynchon is a consistently better writer, taking the best parts of this style and really elevating it through the introduction of a lot of nabokovian influences and some of his own flair into something that achieve greatness not just in fits and spurts

goosedollaz's review against another edition

2.75

adventurous medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

shrek1's review against another edition

4.0

adventurous emotional medium-paced

patwilson621's review against another edition

3.0

This book was weird. I felt like I had to read it because of its fame and place in history. I kind of found it enjoyable as the pace was fast and the narration of the audiobook is top notch. However, I found the ethos to be pretty morally vapid. The main character and his protagonist are hedonistic in the extreme, really only their own pleasure and showing no compassion or connection to those around them, including the women with whom they are involved and the children they seem to have accidentally. Worth the read to understand a cultural movement at a moment and time, if only to say, "well I'm glad that's done"