John Clellon Holmes – författare

The novel that launched the beat generation's literary legacy describes the world of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and Neal Cassady. Published two months before Kerouac began ON THE ROAD, GO is the first and most accurate chronicle of the private lives the Beats lived before they became public figures. In lucid fictional prose designed to capture the events, emptions and essence of his experience, Holmes describes an individualistic post-World II New York where crime is celebrated, writing is revered, and parties, booze, discussions, drugs and sex punctuate life.

The novel that launched the beat generation's literary legacy describes the world of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and Neal Cassady. Published two months before Kerouac began ON THE ROAD, GO is the first and most accurate chronicle of the private lives the Beats lived before they became public figures. In lucid fictional prose designed to capture the events, emptions and essence of his experience, Holmes describes an individualistic post-World II New York where crime is celebrated, writing is revered, and parties, booze, discussions, drugs and sex punctuate life.

Before the world knew Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Cassady, this “brilliant and important” novel chronicled the author’s early years among the Beats (Los Angeles Free Press). Published five years before On the Road, this candid and perceptive roman à clef chronicles the adventures of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and Neal Cassady before they became literary icons. In dive bars and all-night diners, cabs racing across Manhattan and squalid apartments sticky with “tea” smoke, these would-be artists pursue the ecstatic experiences that shape their work and satisfy their restless desire to live beyond the limits of convention.   At the heart of Go is Paul Hobbes, the alter ego of John Clellon Holmes. An aspiring novelist who shares the same creative interests as his friends, Paul frequently participates in their reckless, self-indulgent behavior. Yet his innate solemnness makes him an outsider, as does his commitment to his marriage. As Paul seeks to strike the right balance between experimentation and orthodoxy, freedom and obligation, he casts a discerning eye on his peers. The result is a thrilling and indispensible portrait of the Beat movement before it took America by storm.

The chief chronicler of the Beat Generation portrays the hangover that followed the giddy early days of the movementin this poignant follow-up to GoDan Verger and May Delano share a loft in New York City, but the passion that brought them together has turned brittle and sour, much like the boozy parties and late-night discussions that so thrilled them a few years ago. The brightest lights of their circle have moved on—visionary poet David Stofksy to a job in advertising, novelist Gene Pasternak to Mexico—and Dan and May eventually decide to do the same, abandoning each other to return to their respective hometowns. On the Connecticut seashore, Dan contemplates the trip to Europe that he has always promised himself, but finds his dissipated habits hard to break. Killing time with Old Man Molineaux, the charismatic town drunk, Dan recognizes what his life might look like in 30 years. Meanwhile, May returns to Louisiana and is surprised to discover Paul Hobbes, a New York friend, playing piano in a bar on the African American side of town. At a wild, drug-fueled party in a dilapidated antebellum mansion, May comes face-to-face with the complicated racial dynamics of the Beat movement. Artful and authentic, melancholy yet tender, Get Home Free pays tribute to a generation that, in daring to break with the patterns of the past, profoundly influenced the future of American culture.