no, just expressing outrage over the characters' values in a On the Road is. Judging some beat literature as if it had promised sober insight, ethical maturity, and durable philosophical yield is like taking a classic of rock music (e.g. Bohemian Rhapsody) and saying "this makes no fucking sense, its flamboyant garbage, no structural rigor whatsoever - go listen to beethoven."
if you read on the road thiking you're going to get carefully distilled philosophical and moral clarity, you're in the wrong Wendy's sir.
Where you see outrage, I see frustration from forcing oneself to read something everyone told you was a must-read
> carefully distilled philosophical and moral clarity
I wasn't looking for moral clarity, I was looking for something interesting to read about the world they live in, some insight
From the review posted above:
"But this is supposed to be okay, because they are visionaries. Their vision is to use the words “holy”, “ecstatic”, and “angelic” at least three times to describe every object between Toledo and Bakersfield. They don’t pass a barn, they pass a holy vision of a barn, a barn such as there must have been when the world was young, a barn whose angelic red and beatific white send them into mad ecstasies. They don’t almost hit a cow, they almost hit a holy primordial cow, the cow of all the earth, the cow whose dreamlike ecstatic mooing brings them to the brink of a rebirth such as no one has ever known."
OTR is "serving" beat literature. But that whole framing of art critique is problematic, it's a very "what do I get out of this?" instead of "what IS this, exactly?" I think what is abrasive about this review is that it's a voice of a picky consumer rather than someone who appreciates art. Like a demanding tourist in an italian village, snapping his fingers at the native waiters and complaining in english that his spaghetti is too aldente, because back at olive garden it's nice and soft. You get what you give, and this is not a generous review.
What I personally experienced is not very relevant, but I was moved by the book - whether it's positive or negative doesn't really matter - it's jazz.
if you read on the road thiking you're going to get carefully distilled philosophical and moral clarity, you're in the wrong Wendy's sir.