Doctor Sax

This is not only my favorite book written by Kerouac, but one of my all time favorites. I read this book at least once every two years or so. That being said, I rarely recommend this book to others. It is not an easy read. The hardest obstacle to overcome is the style in which it is written. Kerouac was more interested in a poetic exploration of childhood rather than a clear exposition. I have a habit of continuing to read, listen, or watch even if I don't understand something. I figure I'll either figure it out on the way, or I'll catch up later. The first person I lent this book to returned it the next day, he stopped reading after two pages. It took me awhile to enter the world of Dr. Sax, but it was well worth the time. When I was young the line between fantasy and reality was fuzzy, and I see this book as exploring that relationship. I particularly enjoy that, as the story progresses, the fantasy world overtakes the more biographical elements. The next person I lent the book to returned it after a month. With it they gave me a page of notes, observations and questions. If you love Kerouac, poetry, and have a flair for the abstract, then this is well worth your time. If you like reading maps and floor-plans masquerading as books, then stick with Michael Crichton and the like.

Great essential book, own most of Kerouacs work an for whatever reason always thought this wouldn't be very good...it's better than good, it's mindbending an breaks doors down, like visions of Neil but in a totally different way, an more accessible to the casual fan....and way better than old angel midnight....it's one of many of j.kerouacs finest moments

Kerowac

This is the shroud of dark dreams and the mournful laugh of of the hidden and forgotten shade if our childhood. @_DrSax

Perfect copy

I liked it but I was glad when I finally finished it. It was probably me, but I've always liked all his other works so I gave this a try.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the publication of Jack Kerouac's (1922-- 1969) "On the Road." The Library of America, among others publishers, has marked the occasion with the publication of a new volume including five Kerouac "Road Novels". I wanted to reread other works by Kerouac besides the "road novels" that are in danger of being overlooked, and I turned to "Dr. Sax". Kerouac wrote "Dr. Sax" in 1952 while living with William Burroughs in Mexico City. It was a difficult time for both writers. Kerouac had already written "On the Road" but could not get it published. Burroughs had just accidentally killed his lover, Joan Vollmer, during a drunken game of "William Tell". "Dr. Sax" proved even more difficult to publish than "On the Road" and did not appear in print until 1959. "Dr. Sax" differs from "On the Road" and the other books in the LOA collection in that it is set in Lowell, Massachusetts, the town where Kerouac grew up. Lowell is a small mill town on the banks of the Merrimack River. During Kerouac's boyhood, it was home to a substantial French-Canadian immigrant population, to a community of Greek Americans and to several other diverse ethnic groups. Kerouac's parents were both immigrants from French Canada. They spoke a dialect of French in their home and Kerouac did not learn English until he was about seven years old. A fascinating part of "Dr. Sax" is the French dialogue among Kerouac and his family -- with Kerouac immediately providing an English rendition in addition to the French. The book is written from the perspective of an adult -- Kerouac in 1952 in Mexico City -- looking back and reflecting upon his childhood and early adolescence from the standpoint of his ongoing difficult life as a writer struggling for publication and combating his own inner demons of drugs and alcohol. It opens with a dream, and Kerouac tells the reader that "memory and dream are intermixed in this mad universe." The book features a strange character the young Kerouac invented named Dr. Sax, a sinister figure in a cape and slouch hat. Dr. Sax is accompanied by other bizzare characters including Count Cordu the Vampire, the Great Snake, the Wizard, and others who live in a large weed-grown abandoned house on a snake-infested hill just outside of Lowell. Kerouac conceived the idea of Dr. Sax from various comic books that were popular when he was a child. "Dr. Sax" is memorable largely for the picture it draws of Kerouac's childhood and of Lowell. (Kerouac is named Jack Duluoz or "Ti Jean" in the book.) It gives good portraits of Kerouac's mother and father and of the family's many moves among the poorer neighborhoods of the town and of Kerouac's older sister and ill-fated brother Gerard who died when he was ten. Kerouac, Ti Jean is portrayed as a sensitive, imaginative and athletic child. The book offers portraints of Kerouac playing baseball and marbles, going to church, engaging in pranks and fights with his childhood friends and enemies, watching movies and reading books, experiencing the first flush of sexuality and learning to masturbate, and learning of death, in the person of Gerard and several others. The book also shows a great deal of Lowell and its environs, especially of a large flood that destroyed much of the city's downtown in 1936. The story of young Ti Jean and of Lowell is punctuated by comic-book like tales of Dr. Sax. Dr. Sax also appears as a shadowy figure commenting upon and observing the life of young Kerouac and his family and friends. There is something sinister about Sax throughout most of the book. He is partly drawn from William Burroughs, as he is shown travelling through South and Central America for various "powders". In the lengthy final chapter of the book, Ti Jean accompanies Dr. Sax in a bizzare chapter in which Sax purports to ward off the forces of evil that threaten Lowell. The story gets a sharp wizard-of-Oz-like twist at the end. With the comic characters and the surprise ending, there is a great deal of mad humor in Dr. Sax, but the tone still is predominantly one of melancholy and reflection. In one particularly good scene, Kerouac's dying uncle prophetically tells him: "my child poor Ti Jean, do you know my dear that you are destined to be a man of big sadness and talent-- it'll never to live or die, you'll suffer like others -- more" The Dr. Sax figure, similarly, seems to show the price Kerouac paid for becoming a writer. The book suggests -- with its subtitle "Faust Part Three" that Kerouac's writing was part of a Faustian bargain with Dr. Sax in which Kerouac paid for his literary imagination with a sad and tormented life. Dr. Sax was Kerouac's favorite among his own novels, and many readers would among his work regard it as his best or second-best after "On the Road." (Other works have their own partisans as well.) This book will interest readers who want to see a lesser-known side of Kerouac. The book is written in a variety of styles. It is erratic and not easy reading. Those who are interested in Kerouac's portrayals of his life in Lowell might also enjoy "Maggie Cassidy" and Kerouac's first and underappreciated book, "The Town and the City". Robin Friedman

I pulled a 1959 copy of Doctor Sax off my shelf for my two-day hot springs retreat - I don't remember how I ended up with it, but the spine looked like it had never been cracked, despite some water and sun damage on the ends of the pages. I tore through it in less than two days -- Kerouac's prose rushes on in a torrent, I can surf it in my brain as quickly as my eyes take it in. Reading aloud to the cat named Elvis, I enjoyed the rhythm and the cadence of Kerouac's words even more. The stories of his childhood - a brown bathrobe, a flood, scaring oneself silly with shadowy characters inspired by radio dramas, acting out a rich fantasy life (stealing swim trunks and scaring a friend as "The Black Thief") along with the flavor of French-Canadian French. The story focuses little on technology or current events - aside from the flood - and makes only one mention of racial segregation. Despite the lack of current events -- the protagonists rich fantasy life reflects some kind of battles, heroes and villains, reflected in the current events of the time without really referring to those events -- more generalized than specific foes. A fast fun read - definitely a different take on the same sort of privileged white male preadolescence in "Dandelion Wine" or other similar stories.

I have to agree with the other reviewer, this is a masterpiece. Personally I love all of his work, but this and "Visions of Cody", are the real corkers.Spellbinding.

ジャック・ケルアックとの出会いは高校生の時で、河出書房から出ている「路上」を何度も読みました。しかし、やはり「路上」のような作品は、２度と出ない、ということでしょうか。 話の筋以前に、まず、英語が容赦なく、難解です。最初の５０ページまでしか、読むことができなかったのですが、ドラキュラが出てきたかと思えば、野球の話が始まったり・・・。何の話なのか、よく分かりません。野球の話、ということだと、やはり、故郷の少年時代の親友達との話が始まると、止まらない感じで・・・。読者からすると、ただダラダラしているだけの感じです。もちろん、私の英語力の問題があり、英語が達者、かつこの作家を愛する方なら、楽しめるかもしれません。しかし、私は、一応、この作家と、ビート・ジェネレーションの時代と人間模様が好きなつもりですが、この作品は最後まで読もうという気持ちにはなれませんでした。繰り返すようですが、英語が相当に達者で、ケルアックがとても好きなので、ある程度、失望覚悟、ということでないと、購入はお薦めしません。