On the Road: Columbia Studios, Hollywood, California

Click on Thumbnail for MapNote: First published on Blogger on September 23, 2007

Unfolding the Map

Sal is back in Hollywood, but this time he's looking to get out of town. Join the journey by clicking on the map.

Book Quote

"Terry bought my breakfast. I had my canvas bag all packed and ready to go to New York, as soon as I picked up my money in Sabinal. I knew it was waiting there for me by now. I told Terry I was leaving. She had been thinking about it all night and was resigned to it. Emotionlessly she kissed me in the vineyard and walked off down the row. We turned at a dozen paces, for love is a duel, and looked at each other for the last time.

"I got out on the highway and hitched a ride at once. It was the fastest, whoopingest ride of my life....We made Sabinal to LA in the amazing time of four hours flat about 250 miles. He dropped me off right in front of Columbia Pictures in Hollywood."

On the Road, Chapter 13

Columbia Studios, Hollywood, California

I was listening to a story on Studio 360, a radio program distributed over the public radio networks, a few days ago. You can access the program here. The show was devoted to the concept of being On the Road, and there was a segment about a discussion/disagreement between people who were just married. I started listening in the middle of the story, so I didn't hear how it started, but it appeared that the husband counted On the Road as one of his favorite books, a book that spoke to him. The segment seemed to have been put together by his wife, who read the book for the first time, and she did not understand what appealed so much to her partner about the book. For her, the book was simply about Sal Paradise careening from place to place, looking for a questionable character (Dean), doing drugs, and displaying questionable attitudes and actions toward women throughout the journey. Not only that, she could not get into the writing -- she was only able to find one instance where the writing sort of moved her. She was on a journey to understand the book so that she could understand why her partner felt so strongly about it.

I must say that on my first reading of the book, I had much similar attitudes toward it. I was underwhelmed by the writing, and I was underwhelmed by the things that were important to Sal. I still wonder about places and people that Sal met that he did not describe to their fullest in his haste to catch up with Dean in Denver, or get to San Francisco. I wanted to know more about those things and people in between (hence me using this book as my first project on Littourati).

However, to me Sal's relationship with Terry was one of the only times in the book where he truly had more than a fleeting relationship with a woman. It feels like he truly fell in love, and that for a moment in time he planned to spend time with her. Jack uses his best writing about women and love and Sal's feelings in the book to describe this relationship. Ultimately, Sal's restlessness, the lure of the road, the less than romantic nature of the life he would have to live, and the need to get back to familiar places on the East Coast overcome what Terry has to offer. She is Mexican, after all. She has lots of family and support, hardscrabble though it may be, where she is. Sal realizes that he is not cut out for, nor is he very interested in, a life of picking cotton or trucking manure around. So he leaves. Terry does not whine or throw things at him (constant themes among the women involved in relationships with his friends). She is emotionless as she walks away. Perhaps she wasn't in love. Perhaps she knows how Sal really is -- within a day or so he'll be making moves on some other woman on a bus. I don't know. But I do know that of all Sal's relationships, this one rings most true for the multi-sided facets of Sal's (and Jack's) nature.

By the way, the woman in the radio story gains a deeper understanding of the book after a professor who teaches the book tells her what he thinks Sal's motivations are. The book may be like my experience of the Three Stooges. Men get them, like them, and laugh. Women just don't find them humorous. Perhaps On the Road is similar.

If you want to know more about Columbia Studios, or more about the relationship that Sal's relationship with Terry was based on

Jack Kerouac and Bea Franco: an excerpt from Jack Kerouac: A Biography by Michael Dittman
Jan Kerouac (Jack's daughter) reading her poem about Jack Kerouac (on Studio 360)
On how Jack's relationship with Bea Franco was emblematic of Beat fascination with Mexican culture

Old Columbia Studios: Sunset and Gower
Wikipedia: Columbia Studios

Next up: Indio, California

On the Road: Selma ("Sabinal"), California

Click on Thumbnail for MapNote: First published on Blogger on September 21, 2007

Unfolding the Map

Sal reaches "Sabinal," which from everything I've read is supposed to represent Selma, California. Hang with Sal, picking cotton, and get ready for the long trip back east. Check out how far we've come by clicking the map.

Book Quote

"Terry had a new idea. We would hitchhike to Sabinal, her hometown, and live in her brother's garage....On the road I made Terry sit down on my bag to make her look like a woman in distress, and right off a truck stopped and we ran for it, all glee-giggles. The man was a good man, his truck was poor. He roared and crawled on up the valley. We got to Sabinal in the wee hours before dawn.

"Her brother's name was Rickey. He had a '38 Chevy....The buddy did the explaining -- his name was Ponzo, that's what everybody called him. He stank. I found out why. His business was selling manure to farmers...

"Nothing was going to happen except for starvation for Terry and me, so in the morning I walked the countryside asking for cotton-picking work....I pictured myself picking at least three hundred pounds a day and took the job....But I knew nothing about picking cotton....Every day I earned approximately a dollar and half. It was just enough to buy groceries in the evening on the bicycle."

On the Road, Chapter 13

Selma, California

I'm not sure why Jack substituted "Sabinal" for Selma, but he's an author, and author's can do what they want. Perhaps he didn't want people going to look for traces of him there if his book got big. Perhaps he didn't want people looking up a girl who might be "Terry." But for whatever reason, it seems he changed the name.

Have you ever done jobs that seemed like they would be a good thing, only to find that they are much harder and make you a lot less money than you'd hoped? I think even when we get old enough to know better, a need for money makes us do things we might have been better off not doing. I recently had such an experience myself.

I am a student, and am making little money. So I decided to take a job catering. Now, my only other experience around the food industry was when I was 16. I did all right as a dishwasher, but I learned then that restaurant owners and chefs were troublesome people to deal with. The chef is quite well known in the city where I live, and at the time he was running a catering business out of the kitchen where he was a head chef. I thought it would be an easy, part-time gig with few problems. However, I learned otherwise. I couldn't please the chef. He constantly belittled me. I made some mistakes, it is true. But something about his demeanor and the way he related to me pushed all the wrong buttons. I finally quit after I found out just what kind of person he was. I knew that one patron had given me and a colleague a tip on the check, because she told me. After I gave him the check (and he was boasting about how he had gotten a big tip that night even though he was 30 minutes late for the delivery because he got lost) I said "maybe we got a tip too, because we helped the person light her fondue pot when she couldn't do it." He made a show of looking at the check, and then said "Nope, written for the exact amount of the bill." I didn't complain, but I didn't show up for any more catering gigs. The money wasn't all that great, the work was difficult, and I had come to hate the chef for that incident, and for others I had heard.

Sal isn't in such a difficult situation, but he has taken work in a low-income profession. These were the professions available to Terry and her family at the time. Low-wage, dirty, and hard. In a sense, you have to admire Sal for trying. He doesn't seem to be afraid of trying new and difficult jobs - perhaps the adventuresome spirit of a writer. But, he isn't going very far on that kind of money, and he's dreaming of he and Terry in New York. Something has to give - and it will very soon.

If you want to know more about Selma

City of Selma
Selma Chamber of Commerce
Selma Enterprise (newspaper)
Wikipedia: Selma
Wikipedia: Victor Davis Hanson (historian and columnist who grew up in Selma)

Next up: Columbia Pictures Studios, Los Angeles, California

On the Road: Bakersfield, California (again)

Click on Thumbnail for MapNote: First published on Blogger on September 19, 2007

Unfolding the Map

Who would have thought we'd be heading back to Bakersfield with Sal. But, here we go. Curious about where we are? Check out the map by clicking on it.

Book Quote

"In the morning we boldly struck out on our new plan. We were going to take a bus to Bakersfield and work picking grapes. After a few weeks of that we were headed for New York in the proper way, by bus....We arrived in Bakersfield in late afternoon....But there were no jobs to be had....We went across the SP tracks to Mexican town. Terry jabbered with her brethren, asking for jobs....I was beginning to despair...so we bought a quart of California port for thirty-five cents and went to the railroad yards to drink. We found a place where hobos had drawn up crates to sit over fires....Ah, it was a fine night, a warm night, a wine-drinking night, a moony night, and a night to hug your girl and talk and spit and be heavengoing. This we did....Occasionally bums passed, Mexican mothers passed with children, and the prowl car came by and the cop got out to leak, but most of the time we were alone and mixing up our souls ever more and ever more till it would be terribly hard to say good-by."

On the Road, Chapter 13

Bakersfield, California

In my first post on Bakersfield, I focused on how Bakersfield is a proverbial end of the road for many Californians, a gate of hell almost. At least it was for this native Northern Californian where all California south of San Francisco was painted with "Here Be Dragons" on my parents' imaginary map. Sal certainly uses it as a gateway to the LA area. But now we see that it is a gateway of sorts again. Sal foreshadows the end of his romance with Terry by alluding to the eventual goodbye. But not yet. They sit and in terms both vulgar and romantic, they have a bit of romance.

We have all passed in and through doors. If we think of Los Angeles as a big room where Sal played for a while, then we see that Sal is leaving by the same Bakersfield door as he came in. A little wizened perhaps, maybe a little chastened. He's thinking about heading back to New York. Not that there isn't any more adventure. He will still have some more experiences in California, as we will see, before he sets his sight to the east. But the point is, we know when it's time to enter a place, and we all know when it's time to exit. I think Sal knows now that he's beginning the end of his trip and that California will be a distant memory (for now). Unlike Orpheus, he won't be looking back as he goes.

I don't have too much more to say since I've already written about Bakersfield.

Even more About Bakersfield? Let's let some bloggers and such point the way

Bake Town, CA
Bakersfield Californian
Bakotopia
Eye of Bakersfield
Hello Bakersfield
One Bakersfield Woman's Blog to Mankind

Next up: Selma, California

On the Road: Arcadia, California

Click on Thumbnail for Map

Note: First published on Blogger on September 13, 2007

Unfolding the Map

I'm back for a post, everyone. Sorry for the delay. I'm trying to finish a dissertation and apply for jobs. And I went to El Salvador for five weeks. It's too bad that these things have to get in the way of the fun stuff, but I'm sure that Sal and Jack would have mocked my efforts to get myself into academia...I'd be quite a square in their eyes. Oh well...click on the map to see where we are!

Book Quote

"Terry and I had to decide absolutely and once and for all what to do. We decided to hitch to New York with our remaining money. She picked up five dollars from her sister that night. We had about thirteen or less. So before the daily room rent was due again we packed up and took off on a red car to Arcadia, California, where Santa Anita racetrack is located under snow-capped mountains. It was night. We were pointed toward the american continent."

On the Road, Chapter 13

Arcadia, California

It's interesting what happens when you reach a point where you know what you're doing just isn't working, and yet you have no idea what to do next. Sal and Terry are at that point. Their plan to make it in LA has gone nowhere, and they are down to their last few pennies. We've all hit those points in our lives. I think that I've hit those points a lot in the last 10 years.

Recently, my sister hit that point, and like Sal, she made a decision to stop trying to force herself into jobs that weren't working for her, and decided to go home. She is now back with my mother, and trying to figure out where her life is going next.

It's a lonely place. Some don't understand why you've decided to give up. Others understand, but your leaving means that those people who were important at that time in your life may drift away. In some ways, it feels like a regression, not a progression. You've failed, and now you must wallow in your misery and go back to all those people who want to say "I told you so."

Sal has spent a lot of time and energy to get out to the West coast. Now, as he says, he is pointed toward the american continent, in Arcadia. Arcadia's name has roots in Greek mythology. Arcas was the son of Zeus by Callisto in one of Zeus' infamous seductions. Arcas eventually ruled Arcadia and was the world's greatest hunter. And in a way, Sal is hunting. He stands at the cusp of a new decision, searching for a direction, seeking the shelter of his familiar New York.

One day Arcas accidentally killed his mother, who was disguised as a Great Bear, and Zeus put them in the heavens as Ursa Major and Ursa Minor. The end of the tail of Ursa Minor is Polaris, the North Star. As we will see, Sal and Terry cannot escape the pull north very easily...they think they will go east, but they must go north to get there.

If you want to know more about Arcadia

City of Arcadia
Santa Anita Racetrack
Santa Anita Racetrack Assembly Center for WWII Japanese Relocation
Wikipedia: Arcadia, California

Next up: Bakersfield, California (again!)

On the Road: Central Avenue, Los Angeles, California

Click on Thumbnail for MapNote: First published on Blogger on May 4, 2007

Unfolding the Map

Though Jack doesn't say where he is on Central Avenue, I've taken the liberty to mark his visit to the area at 42nd and Central, the site of the Dunbar Hotel and the home of the modern day Central Avenue Jazz Festival. Central Avenue was the heart of the jazz scene in LA in the 1940s and 50s, and Jack was a jazz lover, so this makes sense. If you want to see where we are, click the map.

Book Quote

"Terry came out and led me by the hand to Central Avenue, which is the colored main drag of LA. And what a wild place it is, with chickenshacks barely big enough to house a jukebox, and the jukebox blowing nothing but blues, bop, and jump. We went up dirty tenement stairs and came to the room of Terry's friend Margarina, who owed Terry a skirt and a pair of shoes. Margarina was a lovely mulatto; her husband was black as spades and kindly....The wild humming night of Central Avenue -- the night of Hamp's 'Central Avenue Breakdown' -- howled and boomed along outside. They were singing in the halls, singing from their windows, just hell be damned and look out."

On the Road, Chapter 13

Central Avenue, Los Angeles, California

Of all the stops that Kerouac makes on his trip, I think this area must have been one of the most interesting places to be. This area has long been associated with the African-American population of Los Angeles, and has been the focal point for a couple of infamous news stories in the 20th century. It was in this general area, a little farther south, that the Watts riots took place in 1965. It was also in this general area, South Florence and Normandie, that the Rodney King riots happened in 1992.

However, in the 1940s, Central Avenue was the home of some of the most electrifying jazz and R&B in the country. Many of the biggest names in jazz music established themselves and helped create a Central Avenue sound that was unmatched. A night on Central Avenue must have been a night to remember. Jack describes the sounds Sal hears as he waits at Terry's friend's apartment. He describes hearing Lionel Hampton, "Hamp," an amazing jazz musician who established the vibraphone as a bona fide jazz instrument, in the "humming night." I'm sure that any modern jazz aficionado would have killed to be at that moment in time on Central Avenue.

I became aware of the Central Avenue sound when I purchased for my wife a four CD set called "Jazz on Central Avenue." Highlighting jazz from the 1920s through the 1950s, the set covers jazz luminaries from Jellyroll Morton to Miles Davis to Charlie Parker to Charles Mingus. All of these performers were either frequent visitors to Central Avenue, or residents of the area who most certainly performed there. It is a great CD set, and one that I've enjoyed in the years since we've had it.

In this day and age, when jazz has largely been confined to aficionados due to the overwhelming presence of pop and rock, it is easy to forget that jazz in the 40s was the pre-emininent American musical artform, and influenced the pop sounds of the day. People were as passionate about Miles Davis or John Coltrane then as they are about Britney and Justin, the Shins and 50 Cent, today. I know that I'm showing a lot of my ignorance of pop music by highlighting people who are not the flavor of the day, but I think you'll get my point. For Jack, who is in the middle of this scene at the right time, smoking "tea" and listening to the sounds of the Central Avenue night, it must have seemed like heaven.

If you want to know more about Central Avenue and its music scene

Central Avenue Jazz Festival
Central Avenue Sounds
Robert Gordon's Blog on West Coast Jazz
Wikipedia: Central Avenue

Some musicians of Central Avenue

Big Jay McNeely
Buddy Collette
Charles Mingus
Dexter Gordon
Lionel Hamption: Life and Legacy
Wikipedia: Lionel Hampton

Next up: Arcadia, California