Angela White: Outside Reading 3: On the Road

Jack Kerouac's On the Road, is yet another favorite book of mine. I first read the book during my senior year of high school, and I decided to read it again in my spare time earlier this semester. It is a coming of age story as Sal Paradise travels across the country and encounters many different people and adventures. My favorite quote from the book is "I looked at the cracked high ceiling and really didn't know who I was for about fifteen strange seconds. I wasn't scared; I was just somebody else, some stranger, and my whole life was a haunted life, the life of a ghost. I was halfway across America, at the dividing line between the East of my youth and the West of my future." This quote to me, represents the loss of innocence and security in the life of Sal, or Jack himself seeing as the character is based on him. This quote has stuck with me since the first time I read the book, and probably will for the rest of my life. It shows the reader that the character has come to terms with the fact that his life is changing and he is becoming a person that he no longer knows, and that he is growing up. To me, this quote is pivotal in understanding the concept of the entire book.