Kerouac Ascending: Memorabilia of the Decade of On the Road
Author: Elbert Lenrow
Date Of Publication: Nov 2010
Isbn13: 978-1-4438-2416-3
Isbn: 1-4438-2416-X
Kerouac Ascending: Memorabilia of the Decade of On the Road is a memoir written by Elbert Lenrow about his relationship with Jack Kerouac, whom he taught at the New School in New York when Jack was emerging as a writer, and with Allen Ginsberg, both of whom Lenrow befriended and encouraged. Lenrow writes with sympathy and charm about both writers and their “beat” friends, revealing Kerouac’s seriously academic side by sharing papers he wrote in his course and giving insight about both writers through letters and poems they shared or wrote in Lenrow’s apartment. In her preface, Katherine Burkman, editor and cousin to Lenrow, gives a context for the memoir, expanding on Lenrow’s gifts as a teacher while Lenrow’s niece, Barbara Phillips, adds further insights. Howard Cunnell’s Introduction offers excellent material on the young Kerouac’s development, partly under Lenrow’s tutelage. An appendix of Ginsberg’s handwritten letters to Elbert, typewritten in the memoir, reveals the drama of his own handwriting and the enormous warmth in his relationship with Lenrow over a period of many years.

With an introduction by Howard Cunnell.

Katherine H. Burkman, Professor Emeritus from The Ohio State University, has published widely in the field of modern drama, especially on Harold Pinter: The Dramatic World of Harold Pinter: Its Basis in Ritual, Pinter at Sixty, The Grove press Guide to Harold Pinter and on Samuel Beckett: Myth and Ritual in the Plays of Samuel Beckett, The Arrival of Godot: Ritual Patterns in Modern Drama. She has also been active as a playwright, actress, and director.

“Katherine Burkman, best known for her contributions to Harold Pinter, Samuel Beckett, and modern drama studies in general, now provides an essential reference for students of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and the beats through this memoir by Elbert Lenrow. A beloved teacher at the New School for Social Research, Lenrow met and taught Jack Kerouac in the late forties, befriending him and Allen Ginsberg as well. The book offers unprecedented insight into the beats in general and Kerouac’s development as a writer, thinker, and cultural force in American literature. Howard Cunnell, who introduces the book, notes that through his friendship with Kerouac, ‘Lenrow got to ride in what would become the most famous car in modern American literature.’ And thanks to this book, now readers of Kerouac Ascending do, too.”

—Ann C. Hall, Professor, Ohio Dominican University; President, Harold Pinter Society

“The larger significance of the sustained and sustaining friendship between Elbert Lenrow and Kerouac and Ginsberg in this book is that it exhibits Jack and Allen in ways that are seldom, if ever, represented in accounts of their lives. As a bonus, from this fine, small book, the reader can acquire an enriched and enhanced understanding of the multifarious political, literary, and artistic relationships of virtually all the principal players in the cultural scene in the mid- to late 20th century.”

—James L. Battersby, Professor Emeritus of English, Ohio State University

“Always their affectionate elder, Lenrow presents Kerouac and Ginsberg mostly in their own words, making no broad claim or judgments beyond the recognition that both writers spoke for their time as Walt Whitman did for his and that they have become iconic figures for a literary movement. It is a modest but important work presenting original materials saved by a gentle, sensitive, and literate man.”

—Mark S. Auburn, Professor Emeritus of English, former Senior Vice President and Provost at the University of Akron

Price Uk Gbp: 29.99
Price Us Usd: 44.99

Sample pdf (including Table of Contents)