Kerouac's Vision of Individuality in On the Road (Essay Sample)

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Kerouac's Vision of Individuality in On the Road.
Introduction.
Individuality refers to the particular qualities or various traits that a person exhibit that is unique from other people. These qualities or character traits often develop in the lifetime of a person and are dependent on the surrounding environment. The character will, therefore, influence how a person thinks and act toward the various conditions. Jack Kerouac in his novel, On the Road, demonstrate his vision on the individuality. The primary focus given in his work is the growth of human characters as the ability to have personal choices. Throughout the novel, this vision of individuality seems to be unhealthy to those caught up in them. The following essay will look at the detailed view of Kerouac on the subject of character and shows the various hurtful this vision has toward the people.
Jack Kerouac's vision of individuality in his book, On the Road, focus mainly on the ability of a person to make a personal choice. Jack depict a situation where one is making a decision that is separate from the lifestyle of his culture. Sal who is one of the main characters in the book, find himself with a desire of becoming part of another culture. He yearns to be separated and to become part of another race. The pursuit for fun and ultimate joy forces Sal to join his friend Dean in pursuing the Beat. The beat was a person who seemed to enjoy life by living in the moment (Kerouac 1972). As the book progresses, Sal seems to have a growing zeal of wanting a more jovial and fun life. To him, this lives happier since it was not defined by the culture or any other individual. He wanted to own his lifestyle. At the end of the book, the author leaning toward the acknowledgment of Sal best interest were identifying with his choices. It becomes clearer that the author desire Sal and Dean to separate themselves from their culture and find a more satisfying one. This view is harmful considering that the urge of wanting more and more can stretch people to even dangerous places. Sal travels to so many places smoking cigarettes and end up living with Dean. The two marry one wife in the context of defying the social expectations.
Another idea which runs throughout the novel and depicts the author's vision of individuality is the desire to live in the moment. When the story is beginning, we can see how the main character, Sal describe the Beat. From Sal point of view, this person is the seen as the best and thus the man to beat. He is always mad to live, talk and to be saved. This is derived from the desirous nature of Beat to enjoy every moment of his life. The effect of this according to Sal is the burning like of a fabulous yellow Roman candle life (Kerouac 1972). It is from this kind of description where one can argue that the author view of individuality is a notion of a person to live in the moment based on their choices. There is, however, a problem that continually exists throughout the novel. The fact the Beat continuously changes throughout the book can suggest that this viewpoint is dependent on surrounding events. This can become critical dangerous since a person cannot develop strong character. The desire to want to live for the moment can become very harmful to the person and make them live under those conditions they had previously objected. This is mainly shown when Sal and Dean sleep in Detroit movie theater after failing to get an affordable place to sleep. Early, Sal had described people who live under such place as trash and discarded by the society. From the above, it can be seen that the vision of individuality by the author can be hurtful since the choice and desire to live in the moment forces the people to live in conditions their feel are dangerous.
The Kerouac's vision of individuality seems to be time dependent. The notion suggests that the character of an individual can be influenced and ultimately determined by how the surrounding things are changing with time. Since time and the surrounding conditions are continuous, Kerouac seems to suggest that the character of a person will change with time. Sal ofte