The Father We Never Found...

In this recording, Kerouac reads from the final scene from On the Road. The "ragged" and broken hero Dean Moriarity heads off for the West again, leaving Sal behind in New York. The image of the hobo, both Dean Moriarity the father, and now Dean Moriarity the son, is used as a stepping stone for Kerouac's vision of a united America. The road and the land it runs through becomes a unifying vision of America under the stars with "all the people dreaming in the immensity of it." The book ends by invoking the idea of the lost father, the old Dean Moriarity, that Sal and Dean never found. The quest for the hobo father is left unfinished, suggesting that the road never ends, but is only abandoned at points of time.

Kerouac reading
Image: Neal Cassady, inspiration for Dean Moriarity in On the Road.