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A review by msand3
The Road by Jack London
4.0
Fifty years before Kerouac, Jack London published a memoir about his life “on The Road.” In this case, The Road was the railroad, as London describes his years as a hobo riding the rails across the country. The essays are rather loosely connected, arranged by topic rather than chronologically. Indeed, only toward the end does London delve into how he began his life as a hobo after his teenage years as an infamous oyster pirate in San Francisco. (And you think THAT’S weird? Just wait until you read [b:John Barleycorn: Alcoholic Memoirs|288301|John Barleycorn Alcoholic Memoirs|Jack London|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1356889870l/288301._SY75_.jpg|2059278] or hear about his time in Asia!)
But back to this book: the highlights are London’s encounters with the justice system -- being beaten by cops (“bulls”) for no reason other than being a poor guy walking down the street, the farcical “trial” that hobos must face, and the time he spent in prison. London portrays the graft and social caste of the prison as a mirror of the American capitalist system. Like businessmen or government officials, the prisoners barter, take bribes, abuse their authority, form trusts (of a sort), run underground black markets, and form communication syndicates.
When he’s not in prison, London is immersed in the subculture of the tramps: their communal bond, their slang, their sharing of resources, their survival skills, and most importantly, their stories. London states that he refines his storytelling craft by not only listening to and engaging with his fellow hobos in telling their stories “on The Road,” but also by spinning elaborate narratives to secure food/housing from sympathetic people or to evade being locked up by the police. As with the other London memoirs I’ve read, it is fascinating, beautifully written, thought-provoking, and entirely male-centric. London’s language is both wonderfully archaic, but also surprisingly modern. He sounds at times like he’s writing in 2007 rather than 1907.
Recommended for those interested in American history/culture, adventure narratives, or even the roots of the later mid-twentieth-century Beat ethos. To be read alongside the fictional accounts [b:Sister of The Road: The Autobiography of Boxcar Bertha|680141|Sister of The Road The Autobiography of Boxcar Bertha - as told to Dr. Ben Reitman|Ben L. Reitman|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1328696807l/680141._SY75_.jpg|666540] by Ben Reitman and [b:On the Road|70401|On the Road|Jack Kerouac|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1413588576l/70401._SX50_.jpg|1701188] by Kerouac.
But back to this book: the highlights are London’s encounters with the justice system -- being beaten by cops (“bulls”) for no reason other than being a poor guy walking down the street, the farcical “trial” that hobos must face, and the time he spent in prison. London portrays the graft and social caste of the prison as a mirror of the American capitalist system. Like businessmen or government officials, the prisoners barter, take bribes, abuse their authority, form trusts (of a sort), run underground black markets, and form communication syndicates.
When he’s not in prison, London is immersed in the subculture of the tramps: their communal bond, their slang, their sharing of resources, their survival skills, and most importantly, their stories. London states that he refines his storytelling craft by not only listening to and engaging with his fellow hobos in telling their stories “on The Road,” but also by spinning elaborate narratives to secure food/housing from sympathetic people or to evade being locked up by the police. As with the other London memoirs I’ve read, it is fascinating, beautifully written, thought-provoking, and entirely male-centric. London’s language is both wonderfully archaic, but also surprisingly modern. He sounds at times like he’s writing in 2007 rather than 1907.
Recommended for those interested in American history/culture, adventure narratives, or even the roots of the later mid-twentieth-century Beat ethos. To be read alongside the fictional accounts [b:Sister of The Road: The Autobiography of Boxcar Bertha|680141|Sister of The Road The Autobiography of Boxcar Bertha - as told to Dr. Ben Reitman|Ben L. Reitman|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1328696807l/680141._SY75_.jpg|666540] by Ben Reitman and [b:On the Road|70401|On the Road|Jack Kerouac|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1413588576l/70401._SX50_.jpg|1701188] by Kerouac.