This long overdue reevaluation of Jack Kerouac gives fresh perspectives on his unique literary output, his vexed relation to issues of race, class, and gender, as well as his continuing cultural afterlife.This collection of essays by esteemed Beat commentators reassesses of one of the 20th century's most emblematic but often misunderstood American writers. Despite amassing a substantial body of influential work and becoming a recognizable icon globally, Kerouac has often suffered critical neglect, and this volume seeks to offer a range of fresh perspectives on his unique artistic output as well as his continuing cultural afterlife.Through an examination of classic texts like On the Road to more obscure ones like Pic, these essays recalibrate our understanding of the writer by placing his creative output into dialogue with current cultural issues to provide a rethinking of how concerns such as race, gender relations, artificial intelligence, populist rhetoric, and queerness inform his work and its contemporary reception. These essays also examine how the peculiarities of global circulation and social media influence the ongoing cultural appropriation of Kerouac in popular music, literature, and online.Through these varied approaches, Rethinking Kerouac: Afterlives, Continuities, Reappraisals provides an indispensable account of the continued relevance of both Kerouac the writer and Kerouac the cultural icon in the 21st century.

PrefaceRobert Lee, Emeritus, Nihon University, TokyoIntroductionErik Mortenson, Lake Michigan College, USA and Tomasz Sawczuk, University of Bialystok, PolandI. Rethinking the Writing1. Kerouac's Poetry and the Jazz AestheticAldon Nielsen, Penn State University, USA2. Reading a Copy of On the RoadMatt Theado, Kobe City University of Foreign Studies, Japan3. Jack Kerouac's Paintings: Color, Texture, MovementFrida Forsgren, University of Agder, Norway4. "Everything Is a Vision": Lonesome Traveler, Buddhism, and the Fictions of Kerouac's Non-FictionSteven Belletto, Lafayette College, USA5. "Radical Vulnerability" in Kerouac's Big Sur, Satori in Paris, and Vanity of DuluozDeborah R. Geis, DePauw University, USAII. Kerouac and the Social6. "Looking at a m. in the e.": Anti-homosexual Paranoia, Queer Love and Cold War Poetics in Jack Kerouac's Visions of CodyPierre-Antoine Pellerin, University of Lyon 3 - Jean Moulin, France7. Contemplating Sex: Solutions to the Problem of Desire in Dharma Bums, with Reference to Christopher Isherwood's The World in the EveningJohn Whalen-Bridge, National University of Singapore8. Jack Kerouac's Blackface Novel: Recovering PicKurt Kemmer, Harper College, USA9. Jack Kerouac and the Language of PopulismNancy M. Grace, The College of Wooster, USA10. Kerouac's Fellahin Poetics: Reimagining Global Culture against Nation and EmpireHassan Melehy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USAIII. Kerouac's Influence and Legacy11. From Beat Generation to Hacker Generation: The Experimental Road Narratives On the Road and 1 the RoadPeggy Pacini, CY Paris Cergy Université / UMR 922 - Héritages, France12. Still Rockin' in the Beat World: Kerouac's Enduring Influence on Anglo-American Popular Music Composers and PerformersSimon Warner, University of Leeds, UK13. Jack Kerouac: American AvatarRonna C. Johnson, Tufts University, USA14. The Futures of Kerouac's Past: Public Humanities and the Kerouac Archive at 100Michael Millner, University of Massachusetts, Lowell, USA15. Kerouac's TranslationsErik Mortenson, Lake Michigan College, USA and Tomasz Sawczuk, University of Bialystok, Poland, with Minami Aoyama and Farid GhadamiAfterwordTim Hunt, Emeritus, Illinois State University, USABibliographyIndex