extension english 'after the bomb' : on the road (kerouac) and kiss me deadly

7/22/2019 Extension English 'After the Bomb' : On the Road (Kerouac) and Kiss Me Deadly

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WAYS OF THINKING


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ON THE ROAD

Jack Kerouac

KISS ME

DEADLY


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The post-war period (1945-1989) saw the

emergence of texts that challenged

conventional ways of thinking through the

ideasthey explored and through their

manipulationof textual form.


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ON THE ROADJack Kerouac


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FORM

Kerouac challenges convention with form and style.

Stream of consciousness style writing

Spontaneous Prose.

Attempted to move language at the speed ofexperience.

A stylistic breakaway from modernist literature: no

arduous attention to form rather, free uninhibited

language which delved into a deeper part of thehuman experience.


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Attempt to replicate the improvisationaltechniques of jazz in the creative prose of

the novel.

Sentences ripped from theirconventions and the rules of grammar

and syntax ignored.

Plot moves in a non-linear zig zag way.


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So in America when the sun goes down and I sit

on the old broken-down river pier watching the

long, long skies over New Jersey and sense allthat raw land that rolls in one unbelievable huge

bulge over the West Coast, and all that road going,

and all the people dreaming in the immensity of it

and in Iowa I know by now the children must becrying in the land where they let the children cry,

and tonight the starsllbe out, and dont you know

that God is Pooh Bear?

Colloquial tone: and tonight the starsllbe outUse of comma contributes to the rapid pace and

rhythm of though (speed of experience).

Vivid detail conveyed through present tense: the

reader is catapulted into Kerouacs world.


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Weve got to go someplace, find something.

Relentless search for an elusive self realisation: a destination which can

never be found.

Paints a portrait of a youth inflused with idealism and searching formeaning they couldnt find in the conformist post-war world.

A sense of perpetual motion is created through language and the

journey and events of the story.


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Somewhere along the line I knew thered begirls, visions, everything; somewhere along

the line the pearl would be handed to me.Use of symbolism, the pearl representing

the deeper wisdom the Beats searchedfor, something which transcended reality

and wasnt able to be found in society.


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The apple pie and ice cream a recurring

motif which is a metaphor for the central

theme of consumption.

I ate apple pie and ice cream. It wasgetting better as I got deeper into Iowa,

the pie bigger, the ice cream richer.

The symbol of comfort and home.


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My Aunt and I decided to buy a new electricrefrigerator with the money I had sent to her

from California. It was to be the first one in

the family.The symbol of American domesticity.

Represented a desire to move up in society:

the pursuit of the American dream.

Use of a conventional sentence structure,

strikingly different to other parts of the novel.


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Presents the idea of an entrenchedculture of consumerismin America.

Juxtaposed this with dominant overtonesthat speak to be counter-cultural andfree.

Characters raring to escape conventionyet still pursue the American Dream.

Illustrates a certain discomfort andprotest against societys inescapableentanglement.


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REPRESENTING THE

OUTCASTSegregation and discrimination is rejected

through the representation of many

characters as social outcasts who do not

conform to the expectations of society.

The denial of segregation is evident

though the idealisation of the hobo, the

mad man, the African American.


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I was only myself, Sal Paradise, sad,

strolling in this violent dark, this unbearably

sweet night, wishing I could exchange words

with the happy, true hearted ecstatic

negroes of America.

Highly emotive language which evokes a

real sense of affection and also naivety.


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KISS MEDEADLY


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FORM


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FRAGMENTATION


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Notion of fragmentation used to depict

soundtrack (primarily non-diagetic sounds)

unconventionally.

Uses of sound and image that are not

unified serve to create an irrational

disrupted atmosphere.


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LINKS OF FEMALE RESISTANCE

Key active female forces who disrupt the

traditional law and order of the world.

Women here are active and autonomous

rather than passive characters who use

their sexuality as weapons.


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THE NUCLEAR THREAT


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COMPARISON

Two texts which utilise unconventional form toproject themes which challenge conventional waysof thinking at the time.

Kerouac through alternative literature conveys arebellion against society in a youth physically andemotionally beat by the political climate at thetime.

Aldrich uses film noir to depict a dark and twisted

brutish world foreshadowed by an imminentnuclear threat.

Both express a repressive political consciousness.

extension english 'after the bomb' : on the road (kerouac) and kiss me deadly

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