A 50th anniversary hardcover edition of Kerouacas classic novel that defined a generation Few novels have had as profound an impact on American culture as "On the Road." Pulsating with the rhythms of 1950s underground America, jazz, sex, illicit drugs, and the mystery and promise of the open road, Kerouacas classic novel of freedom and longing defined what it meant to be abeata and has inspired generations of writers, musicians, artists, poets, and seekers who cite their discovery of the book as the event that aset them free.a Based on Kerouacas adventures with Neal Cassady, "On the Road" tells the story of two friends whose four cross-country road trips are a quest for meaning and true experience. Written with a mixture of sad-eyed naAvetA(c) and wild abandon, and imbued with Kerouacas love of America, his compassion for humanity, and his sense of language as jazz, "On the Road" is the quintessential American vision of freedom and hope, a book that changed American literature and changed anyone who has ever picked it up. This hardcover edition commemorates the fiftieth anniversary of the first publication of the novel in 1957 and will be a must-have for any literature lover.

杰克·凯鲁亚克（Jack Kerouac, 1922-1969），1922年3月12日，凯鲁亚克出生于马萨诸塞州洛厄尔，父母为法裔美国人，他是家中幼子。他曾在当地天主教和公立学校就读，以橄榄球奖学金入纽约哥伦比亚大学，结识爱伦·金斯堡、威廉·巴勒斯和尼尔·卡萨迪等“垮掉的一代”。

凯鲁亚克大学二年级退学从事文学创作，并辗转于美国海军和商用航运公司等处。1950年，第一部小说《乡镇和城市》出版。1957年的《在路上》问世后，他成为“垮掉的一代”的代言人，跻身二十世纪最有争议的著名作家行列。他还著有《达摩流浪者》、《地下人》、《孤独的旅人》和《孤独天使》等作品。

1969年10月21日，凯鲁亚克在佛罗里达圣彼得堡去世，享年47岁。