Kerouac's "The Town and the City"

     This is an impressive first novel. About 400 pages were edited out, and another 100 or so might have added to that number. That being said, Kerouac depicts places extremely well and has some riveting character in the book; patriarch George Martin and his football hero son Peter among them.

     The image one has of Kerouac is the beatnik proto-hippie who was against anything and everything. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Granted, drugs are mentioned in this novel, but they are not the reason for the novel. He does an excellent job in delineating the pressures that gripped America before, during, and after World War II. The Martin children take their places on the stage where the American drama would be played out over the coming decades.

     While not as popular as some of his later works, this first novel deserves to be read and re-evaluated.