Jack Kerouac Quotes - Page 8

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I realized that I had died and been reborn numberless times but just didn't remember because the transitions from life to death and back are so ghostly easy, a magical action for naught, like falling asleep and waking up again a million times, the utter casualness and deep ignorance of it.

Jack Kerouac

Death, Fall, Ignorance

Jack Kerouac (2007). “On the Road”, Viking Press

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Swinging on delicate hinges the autumn leaf almost off the stem.

Jack Kerouac

Fall, Autumn, Leafs

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The Four Inevitabilities: 1. Musty Books. 2. Uninteresting Nature. 3. Dull Existence. 4. Blank Nirvana, buy that boy.

Jack Kerouac

Book, Boys, Four

Jack Kerouac (1971). “The Dharma Bums”, p.130, Penguin

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Believe that the world is an ethereal flower, and ye live.

Jack Kerouac

Believe, Flower, World

Jack Kerouac (1986). “The Dharma Bums”, p.137, Penguin

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What a horror it would have been if the world was real, because if the world was real, it would be immortal.

Jack Kerouac

Real, Would Be, World

Jack Kerouac (1986). “The Dharma Bums”, p.134, Penguin

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If you own a rug you own too much.

Jack Kerouac

Wisdom, Too Much, Ifs

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It no longer makes me cry and die and tear myself to see her go because everything goes away from me like that now — girls, visions, anything, just in the same way and forever and I accept lostness forever.

Jack Kerouac

Girl, Forever, Vision

Jack Kerouac (1972). “Visions of Cody”, London : André Deutsch

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In my medicine cabinet, the winter fly has died of old age.

Jack Kerouac

Winter, Medicine, Age

Jack Kerouac (2013). “Book of Haikus”, p.30, Penguin

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I'd better be a poet
Or lay down dead.

Jack Kerouac

Poet, Lays

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don't stop to think of the words when you do stop, just stop to think of the picture better-and let your mind off yourself in this work.

Jack Kerouac

Thinking, Mind

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I took a straight picture that made me look like a thirty-year-old Italian who'd kill anybody who said something against his mother.

Jack Kerouac

Mother, Italian, Years

Jack Kerouac (1995). “The Portable Jack Kerouac”, Viking Adult

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A scene should be selected by the writer for haunted-ness-of-mind interest. If you're not haunted by something, as by a dream, a vision, or a memory, which are involuntary, you're not interested or even involved.

Jack Kerouac

Dream, Memories, Mind

Jack Kerouac (2006). “Book of Sketches”, p.65, Penguin

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There are worse things than being mad.

Jack Kerouac

Wisdom, Mad, Being Mad

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Because the only people for me are the mad ones.

Jack Kerouac

Hippie, Yawning, People

On the Road pt. 1, ch. 1 (1957)

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Our battered suitcases were piled on the sidewalk again; we had longer ways to go. But no matter, the road is life.

Jack Kerouac

Inspirational, Inspiring, Travel

Jack Kerouac (1991). “On the road”, Penguin USA

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My whole wretched life swam before my weary eyes, and I realized no matter what you do it's bound to be a waste of time in the end so you might as well go mad.

Jack Kerouac

Wisdom, Eye, Mad

Jack Kerouac (2007). “On the Road: The Original Scroll: (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)”, p.256, Penguin

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I suddenly began to realize that everybody in America is a natural-born thief.

Jack Kerouac

America, Thieves, Realizing

Jack Kerouac (2007). “On the Road: The Original Scroll: (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)”, p.168, Penguin

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No matter how you travel, how 'successful' your tour, or foreshortened, you always learn something and learn to change your thoughts.

Jack Kerouac

Travel, Successful, Matter

Jack Kerouac (2007). “Satori in Paris and Pic”, p.33, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

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Isn't it true that you start your life a sweet child believing in everything under your father's roof? Then comes the day of the Laodiceans, when you know you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, and with the visage of a gruesome grieving ghost you go shuddering through nightmare life.

Jack Kerouac

Sweet, Children, Father

Jack Kerouac (2007). “Road Novels 1957-1960”

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I believed in a good home, in sane and sound living, in good food, good times, work, faith and hope. I have always believed in these things. It was with some amazement that I realized I was one of the few people in the world who really believed in these things without going around making a dull middle class philosophy out of it. I was suddenly left with nothing in my hands but a handful of crazy stars.

Jack Kerouac

Life, Stars, Philosophy

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And the story of love is a long sad tale ending in graves.

Jack Kerouac

Wisdom, Love Is, Long

Jack Kerouac (2016). “Old Angel Midnight”, p.8, City Lights Publishers

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Who can leap the world's ties and sit with me among white clouds?

Jack Kerouac

Clouds, White, Ties

Jack Kerouac (1986). “The Dharma Bums”, p.20, Penguin

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Roaring dreams take place in a perfectly silent mind. Now that we know this, throw the raft away.

Jack Kerouac

Dream, Wisdom, Mind

Jack Kerouac (1960). “The Scripture of the Golden Eternity: Pocket Poets Number 51”, p.72, City Lights Books

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Dharma Bums refusing to subscribe to the general demand that they consume production and therefore have to work for the privilege of consuming, all that cramp they didn't really want anyway such as refrigerators, TV sets, cars, at least new fancy cars, certain hair oils and deodorants and general junk you finally always see a week later in the garbage anyway, all of them imprisoned in a system of work, produce, consume, work, produce, consume.

Jack Kerouac

Hair, Fancy Cars, Oil

"The Dharma Bums". Book by Jack Kerouac, Ch. 13, 1958.

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"What do you want out of life?" I asked, and I used to ask that all the time of girls.

Jack Kerouac

Girl, Wisdom, Want

Jack Kerouac (2007). “On the Road: The Original Scroll: (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)”, p.156, Penguin

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Jack Kerouac

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Born: March 12, 1922
Died: October 21, 1969
Occupation: Novelist
Cite this Page: Citation

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