Published in 1960, Jack Kerouac's Lonesome Traveler is a collection of autobiographical travel essays or, as the author puts it: "a mishmosh of life as lived by an independent educated penniless rake going anywhere." Following on the heels of his popular road novels On The Road and The Dharma Bums, this book covers much of the same material, but in a different way.
Chronicles Kerouac's Travels While Writing
Lonesome Traveler consists of eight 15-35 page essays poetically detailing various excursions Kerouac took throughout America, Mexico and Europe from about 1951 to 1958. During this period the "Beat Generation" author traveled almost continuously, working a variety of jobs, all the while keeping extensive journals and writing drafts of what would become at least half a dozen more published novels.
Some of the essays in Lonesome Traveler were published previously in magazines like Holiday, while others reappeared in slightly different versions in later novels. While most of Kerouac's fiction is heavily autobiographical, these pieces are actually presented as factual accounts, distinguishing this book from most of his others.
Lacking a cohesive, narrative thread, Lonesome Traveler comes across to the reader as just what it is: a collection, probably published to take advantage of his popularity at the time. As the title suggests, the pieces included here are mostly lone travels as well, which is another major difference from the "buddy road trip" books.
Vintage Kerouac Prose, Theme of Solitude
In fact, one of the themes running through many of the essays is the maturing man/author's meditations on solitude, whether "Alone On A Mountaintop" (one of the the essay titles) or a crowded New York subway car. Kerouac's solitude is as much one of the mind as it is a physical separation.
Despite its lack of an overarching storyline, Lonesome Traveler is an entertaining, vibrant book, containing a good deal of "vintage Kerouac" prose. The sometimes-rambling, but always inspired and thoughtful musings of the "king of the beats" (a moniker Kerouac laughed at) are present throughout.
From the aforementioned essay, during his summer working atop Desolation Peak in the Cascade Mountains of Washington as a fire lookout, the author observes: "...you go out and suddenly your shadow is ringed by the rainbow...a lovely haloed mystery making you want to pray. A blade of grass jiggling in the winds of infinity, anchored to a rock, and for your own poor gentle flesh, no answer."
Or, as a railroad brakeman, describing a ride through the "Frisco Valley" (from "A Railroad Earth"): "...the whole world's coming as the big engine booms and balls by with the madman of the whitecap California in there flossing and wow there's just no end to all this wine---."
Kerouac Eulogizes The Vanishing American Hobo
Among the remaining pieces here are details of the author's time spent working as a steward on a steamer, wandering Mexico smoking dope, and trying to find work on the San Francisco docks. The book ends with a eulogy of sorts, "The Vanishing American Hobo", in which Kerouac decries a changing world where "the woods are full of wardens." For the reader, it feels like an appropriate conclusion for a book that, despite its moments of joy, leaves the author still searching for something, vaguely disheartened.
All in all, Jack Kerouac's Lonesome Traveler is successful as a deeper glimpse into the author of On The Road and several other Beat movement novels. Perhaps not the best introduction to Kerouac, it is certainly a requirement for those who've already acquired a taste for him or for anyone looking for some inspired, poetic travel stories.
Kerouac, Jack. Lonesome Traveler, 1988 Grove Press, 183 pages. (ISBN# 13:978-0-8021-3074-7)
