Book description
Jack Kerouac died in 1969 at the age of forty-seven . . . Most of his
friends survived him. Our idea was to seek them out and talk with them
about Jack's life and their own lives. The final result, we hoped, would
be a big, transcontinental conversation, complete with interruptions,
contradictions, old grudges and bright memories, all of them providing a
reading of the man himself through the people he chose to populate his
work.' In this kaleidoscopic portrait of Jack Kerouac, William
Burroughs, Carolyn Cassady, Gregory Corso, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen
Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, Gore Vidal and many others talk, argue and
reminisce about their times with him. But alongside these luminaries of
the Beat generation are the voices of those who knew a different side of
Kerouac: the working men, the childhood friends, the bar companions, the
lovers. Fascinating, honest and richer than any orthodox biography could
be, Jack's Book documents Kerouac's genius in its full, tragic,
contradictory glory. Jack's Book is first rate - it offers the flavor
and depth of good fiction while keeping well within the realm of literal
truth. Barry Gifford's fiction, nonfiction, and poetry have been
published in twenty-eight languages. His novel, Night People was awarded
the Premio Brancati, established by Pier Paolo Pasolini and Alberto
Moravia, in Italy, and he has been the recipient of awards from PEN, the
National Endowment for the Arts, the American Library Association, the
Writers Guild of America, and the Christopher Isherwood Foundation.
Gifford's work has appeared in many publications, including the New
Yorker, Punch, Esquire, La Nouvelle Revue Française, El Pais, La
Republica, Rolling Stone, Brick, Film Comment, El Universal,
Projections, and the New York Times. His film credits include Wild at
Heart, Perdita Durango, Lost Highway, City of Ghosts, Ball Lightning,
and The Phantom Father. Barry Gifford's most recent books are Sailor
& Lula: The Complete Novels and Sad Stories of the Death of Kings.
He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. For more information, visit www.
BarryGifford. com. Lawrence Lee, a Peabody Award-winning journalist,
worked for United Press International, Associated Press, and a number of
television stations in San Francisco. He coauthored Saroyan: A
Biography. He died in 1990.
