Time stops. He's filling empty space with the substance of our lives . . .

"Time stops. He's filling empty space with the substance of our lives, confessions of his bellybottom strain, remembrance of ideas, rehashes of old blowing. he has to blow across bridges and come back and do it with such infinite feeling soul-exploratory for the tune of the moment that everybody knows it's not the tune that counts, but 'IT--' Dean could go no further; he was sweating telling about it."

From this point of inspiration (or should I say perspiration?), I want you to leap, creatively, into the music of your life, creating a soundtrack for your life. A play list, 5-10 songs in length. Not the actual music files, just a list of the songs that you would want to play or listen to as you travel, as you move around campus. As you live. So many of us now move about campus constantly plugged in to our iPods. We remove them only reluctantly and even have conversations while the music continues to play.

Once you've created your play list, I'd like you to talk, in detail, about 3 of the songs. Talk about the lyrics, quote the lyrics, tell us why they speak to you, why they matter to you, what they say to you. Why does this song or piece of music move you? In what way? "It's got mad beats" might be a true statement, but I want a little bit more. Dig deeper! "Dig IT!"

Due Wednesday, October 3rd, by class.

"Man, wow, there's so many things to do . . ."

For your next blog assignment, I'd like you to "dig" through the text, especially this past weekend's reading assignment, and find a passage that you'd like to respond to, mull over, think about, uncover, discover, interpret, and write about! You might consider one of the passages we discussed in class--e.g. Carlo Marx's curious question to Sal Paradise: "What is the meaning of this trip to New York? What kind of sordid business are you on now? I mean, man, whither goest thou? Whither goest thou, America, in thy shiny car at night? (119)--or you can find one on your own. This is your journey, this is your experience. I want to hear from you. I want to read your words.

Your response to the passage that you choose (one paragraph in length) is due Wednesday, September 26, by the start of class.

Go west, young man . . .

Why does Sal/Jack decide to head West? What is it about Dean/Neal that draws him to the road? Consider, too, the quote below as you shape your response:

"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes 'Awww!' (5-6)

Why Whitman? Why Jack?

We begin the term with "A Song of the Open Road" by Walt Whitman. See link below to the poem.

Why? What can we take away from our reading of this poem? Focus particularly on stanzas 1, 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, and 17. Think, too, of Dean's statement to Sal from On the Road: "You spend a whole life on non-interference with the wishes of others . . . and nobody bothers you and you cut along and make it your own way . . . What's your road, man?--holyboy road, madman road, rainbow road, guppy road, any road. It's an anywhere road for anybody anyhow. Where body how?"

Do you see a link between these two works? How do you read them? What is your interpretation? What is each writer trying to say?