ID 1111098
Lot 63 | Kerouac, Jack | Typed letter signed to Neal Cassady, the model for Dean Moriarty in On the Road
Estimate value
$ 10 000 – 15 000
Typed letter signed (“Jack” in pencil), to Neal Cassady, the model for Dean Moriarty in On the Road
One page (406 x 208 mm), [Northport, New York, envelope postmarked 15 September 1960]; single-spaced on typing paper, densely typed filling the sheet, the greeting and a three-word holograph revision in pencil, de-acidified and backed, framed, with the original stamped envelope addressed by Kerouac at back.
"Shall I write like railroad earth? Shall I write like Dharma Bums ... O it's a terrible stew.”
A very fine, quintessential Kerouac letter to his closest friend – one of the central (if not the central) progenitors of the “Beat Generation” — and the model for Dean Moriarty in On the Road (1957). Kerouac, returned to the sanctuary of his mother’s house in Northport after his Big Sur collapse (see his letter to his girlfriend Lois Sorrells in the preceding lot), uncorks his spontaneous prose: “Well, love, a little typing practice here as I gets ready to write a new book god knows why but there just ain’t anything else for me to do and certainly the story of the world as seen thru my eye is story enough to please enough readers in enough brown chairs over the canals of time from here to umpteen toot toot poop oopoopoopoop — rag rag and what is this i want to tell you, well let’s see, first off (just typing practice you see) but with a message which is: I left frisco without seeing you [in Los Gatos] because I was staying at ferlinghetti’s house the last 2 days and he drove me to the airport in the morning ... all i want to say is Everything is fine, everything is okay, i never was so glad in my life my little measly contribution to yr household turned out so good what with the new car, the new job [Cassady had been released from prison in early June], why man when you blatted open that door in big sur [Ferlinghetti’s cabin where Kerouac was staying] and stood there with yr blondes and blonds it was amazing, i felt like, well it was dark in the cabin remember and me and [Michael] mc clure was talking and you sneaked up and suddenly when the door burst open all the light came in and you stood there all 5 of you like archangels but you most of all goddamit face it you looked like an archangel with arm extended as you had — and then when you told me how beautiful everything had worked out and we walked down the trail bliazast to the fence (ing) it felt like the old days when things used to work out for both of us anyway no matter what happened...”
Kerouac spends a long paragraph telling of his chaotic affair while in California with Cassady’s latest mistress (“Jacqueline...the last few days with her were hell”), speaks of his upcoming travels plans (“My next trip will be to Paree, after my birthday, March, and then I’ll be headed back for californiay again”), and turns to writing: “... are you going to write or don’t you have time? (books, I mean) ... what books you could write about everything that’s happened all yr life, like proust, like me when I write a book it’s just a chapter in the whole story but there wd be no literature in the world safe to say i would rather read than yr own remembrance of things — I’ve come to an impasse in style: shall i write like railroad earth? Shall I write like dharma bums for everybody to understand (sailors chewing gum under the reading lamp in greyhound buses) — what’ll I do? It’s too late to write clearly like in dharma bums — o it’s a terrible stew — haven’t seen allen [Ginsberg] yet ... since I’m back home have been sleeping, eating, exercising, walking, having quiet time, planning new books, reading, having quiet ball as tho, and by god this is true, i am now making my home my monastery, Rev. Mother presiding — once in a while I jump the wall and go into N.Y. with my collar turned backward again — and Lois [Sorrells] comes to see me on Fridays for non-nunnery type teachings naturally ... By God we will end up 2 old bums in the alley! It’s coming closer all the time! Silverplated garbage cans! Tuxedo bums! With velvet hoods and a moat.”
| Artist: | Jack Kerouac (1922 - 1969) |
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| Auction house category: | Prints, graphics, books |
| Artist: | Jack Kerouac (1922 - 1969) |
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| Auction house category: | Prints, graphics, books |
| Address of auction |
Sotheby´s 1334 York Avenue 10021 New York USA | ||||||||||||||
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| Phone | +1 212 606 7000 | ||||||||||||||
| Conditions of purchase | Conditions of purchase | ||||||||||||||
| Business hours | Business hours
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| Lot number | 63 |
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| Auction house | Sotheby´s |
| Auction date | 08.12.2023 |
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| Lot number | 63 |
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| Auction house | Sotheby´s |
| Auction date | 08.12.2023 |
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| Auction house | Sotheby´s |
| Auction date | 08.12.2023 |
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| Lot number | 63 |
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| Auction house | Sotheby´s |
| Auction date | 08.12.2023 |
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| Lot number | 63 |
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| Auction house | Sotheby´s |
| Auction date | 08.12.2023 |
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| Auction house | Sotheby´s |
| Auction date | 08.12.2023 |
