{"product_id":"visions-of-cody-9780140179071","title":"Visions of Cody","description":"\u003cb\u003e\"To read \u003ci\u003eOn the Road \u003c\/i\u003ebut not \u003ci\u003eVisions of Cody \u003c\/i\u003eis to take a nice sightseeing tour but to forgo the spectacular rapids of Jack Kerouac's wildest writings.\"--\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"The centerpiece of all [Kerouac's] novels.\"--\u003ci\u003eThe Washington Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eOriginally written in 1951-1952, \u003ci\u003eVisions of Cody \u003c\/i\u003ewas an underground classic by the time it was finally published in 1972, three years after Kerouac's death. Utilizing a radical, experimental form (\"the New Journalism fifteen years early,\" as Dennis McNally noted in \u003ci\u003eDesolate Angel\u003c\/i\u003e), Kerouac examines his own New York life in a collection of colorful stream-of-consciousness essays. Always transfixed by Neal Cassady--here named Cody Pomeray--along with Allen Ginsberg and William Burroughs, Kerouac also explores the feelings he had for a man who inspired much of his work. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eTranscribing taped conversations between members of their group as they took drugs and drank, \u003ci\u003eVisions of Cody \u003c\/i\u003ereveals an intimate portrait of people caught up in destructive relationships with substances, and one another, capturing the members of the Beat Generation in the years before any label had been affixed to them.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eJack Kerouac\u003c\/b\u003e was born in Lowell, Massachusetts, in 1922, the youngest of three children in a Franco-American family. He attended local Catholic and public schools and won a scholarship to Columbia University in New York City, where he first met Neal Cassady, Allen Ginsberg, and William S. Burroughs. His first novel, \u003ci\u003eThe Town and the City\u003c\/i\u003e, appeared in 1950, but it was \u003ci\u003eOn the Road\u003c\/i\u003e, published in 1957 and memorializing his adventures with Neal Cassady, that epitomized to the world what became known as the \"Beat generation\" and made Kerouac one of the most best-known writers of his time. Publication of many other books followed, among them \u003ci\u003eThe Dharma Bums\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe Subterraneans\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eBig Sur\u003c\/i\u003e. Kerouac considered all of his autobiographical fiction to be part of \"one vast book,\" \u003ci\u003eThe Duluoz Legend\u003c\/i\u003e. He died in St. Petersburg, Florida, in 1969, at the age of forty-seven.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Penguin Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50719060656402,"sku":"9780140179071","price":22.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_03b2d6b6-f2f4-45a9-a38a-83d1330054ba.jpg?v=1734657113","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/visions-of-cody-9780140179071","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}