"Very well, then," I said, "but now he;s alive and I'll bet you want to know what he does next and that's because he's got the secret that we're all busting to find..."
"All you think about is what's hanging between your legs and how much money or fun you can get out of people and then you just throw them aside. Not only that but you're silly about it. It never occurs to you that life is serious and there are people trying to make something decent out of it instead of just goofing all the time."
That's what Dean was, the HOLY GOOF.
He was BEAT—the root, the soul of beatific.
And the last I saw of him he rounded the corner of Seventh Avenue, eyes on the street ahead, and bent to it again. Poor little Laura, my baby, to whom I'd told everything about Dead, began almost to cry.
"Oh, we shouldn't let him go like this. What'll we do?"
Old Dean's gone, I thought, and out loud I said, "He'll be all right." And off I went to the sad disinclined concert for which I had no stomach whatever and all the time I was thinking of Dean and how he got back on the train and rode over three thousand miles over that awful land and never knew why he had come anyway, except to see me.
So you got a brief glimpse of the best known work of the Beat writers. If it makes no sense to you today, as some of you expressed today, then imagine reading this in 1957. It's a book true to its subject. Lauryn brought up the way we see women portrayed—and how men like Dean treat them—and when you read the except tonight you realize that the women in the novel feel much the same way about Dean. Kerouac understood the sexism and chauvinism of his characters; and it's no coincidence that his alter ego Sal ends up in a stable relationship at the end of the book—for Sal is a man who feels drawn to the Levittown life, as you all are too.
Here's Kerouac reading on the Steve Allen show the end to "On The Road."
1. Galatea and the other women give Dean an earful: and Dean doesn't seem to hear a word of it—or he doesn't care. He's a pathetic figure with his injured thumb, saying "'Yes, yes, yes" as the women chastise him. Kind of what you did in class today. But Sal defends him. He's The HOLY GOOF after all. What does that mean—the Holy Goof? And does Sal make a good argument for Dean? Is Dean worth venerating and/or elevating the way Sal does? Quote in your response.
2. "He no longer cared about anything (as before) but now he also cared about everything in principle; that is to say, it was all the same to him and he belonged to the world and there was nothing he could do about it." What does this mean? And how does this help explain Dean and his behavior?
3. So the book ends and unlike in real life, Sal never sees Dean again. Your reaction to the end of the novel, from our last glimpse of Dean to Sal on the pier looking west? I know you haven't read the whole book—but what does this ending perhaps say about what Sal got from Dean?
200 words. Answer thoughtfully and thoroughly.
Sal's admission that Dean was, indeed, the HOLY GOOF shows that he knows the argument for Dean being a normal, productive member of society is nonexistent. In order to appreciate Dean, you must accept his silly nature and happy-go-lucky outlook. Galatea pejoratively calls him "silly" and criticizes his "goofing" because, as she states matter-of-factly, "life is serious and there are people trying to make something decent out of it." Is Dean really ruining the lives of others, or is his unique lifestyle simply subverting the status quo? Sal would agree with the latter, which is why he elevates Dean's goofy nature to holy status. There is something more than immaturity or cluelessness to his behavior. Dean has the pearl, and it seems Galatea is simply angry because she isn't willing to sacrifice her ego or security in life to get it.
ReplyDeleteSal's cryptic statement concerning what Dean cares about should be interpreted thusly: Dean's simultaneous lack of care and total, all-encompassing care means that he is simply a participant in the world. "...He belonged to the world and there was nothing he could do about it." Dean doesn't respond to any moral code imposed upon him, nor does he follow any instructions at all with regard to how he lives his life. He has been thrust into the world blindly, and he is just another Beat looking for deeper meaning.
"...Nobody, nobody knows what's going to happen to anybody besides the forlorn rags of growing old..." This is how Sal ends his story. His adventures with the wild Dean Moriarty have concluded, and having settled into a steady relationship, he could conceivably regress to an average life, following the rules and expectations set for him by other (more rational, less adventurous) people. However, this statement implies that he has taken away an important lesson from Dean: no one has a written a guidebook for how to live. No one can tell the future. And, perhaps most importantly, youth is valuable and fleeting. As Sal thinks of Dean, "the father we never found," he becomes more and more certain that his adventures have been worth it.
Sal understands Dean's lifestyle so he's sympathetic to Dean. He defends Dean because he understand why he does what he does. He wants other people to see the beauty that Dean radiates. That beauty is the fact that Dean lives in the moment. He doesn't stress about the consequences of the actions. Therefore he refers to Dean as a "HOLY GOOF". Because his lifestyle is silly and crazy but there's something to praise him for. Praise him for not conforming to the Levitt Town lifestyle. Sal still appreciates Dean's spontaneity and carelessness. He makes this argument to Galatea and the other women by saying, "remember just one thing; this guy has his troubles too, and another thing, he never complains and he's given all of you a damned good time just being himself, and if that isn't enough for you then send him to the firing squad, that's apparently what you're itching to do anyway." During the time where they too were living the Beat lifestyle they didn't complain. That's because they were living in the moment like Dean. Unlike Dean, they grew out of it. They abandoned that lifestyle and compelled back to the Levitt town lifestyle. Whether they agree with how he lives now, Sal brings out a good argument that at the time they didn't complain about Dean. Dean's life is the beat lifestyle. It is apart of him. He isn't going to grow out of it like the others. He chooses to life the way he does. The thing to take into consideration is that it's his choice to be the way he is, a beat. That part of him can't be changed, "You can't teach the old maestro a new tune."
ReplyDeleteThe ending made me pity Dean, as I felt most characters did. As great as being a beat sounds at the end we got to see the effects it has on a person, Dean. It's sad. It symbolizes that nothing can be done without a consequence I believe. Sal got what he was looking for, an escape from the Levitt town lifestyle. He got that. He got the craziness, wildness and liberation of being a beat. Sal, I think, will forever be grateful for that experience. It's important to note the word experience. Sal wanted an experience not a beat lifestyle. He ultimately ended up where he started but he got a feel of being a Beat.
ReplyDeleteSal referring to Dean as the “Holy Goof” shows that although he observes Dean’s silly and uncaring attitude, Sal (unlike Galatea) sees past it and instead views Dean as a model for the ideal lifestyle. In the section where Galatea calls out Dean, the reader sees moments where Sal accepts Dean for what he really is--a goof who doesn’t care for anyone but himself: “I suddenly realized that Dean, by virtue of his enormous series of sins, was becoming the Idiot, the Imbecile, the Saint of the lot.” Even knowing and accepting these things, Sal is still driven to defend Dean. He argues that although Dean may have his issues, he’s: “given all of you a damned good time just being himself.” Sal believes that the good time and the glimpse of freedom that Dean has given them is enough to justify his faults. Looking at the situation objectively, I 100% agree with all Galatea has said. Dean is a selfish character whose only real passion in life is sex. Sal’s justifications of Dean’s actions seem pale in comparison to all that Galatea said. Although we have talked many times in class about the attraction of a person like Dean and I completely understand the beauty of a character like Dean, I think that Sal’s elevation of him is wrong and misguided.
In this moment, Sal reflects on Dean’s carefree attitude. Dean has reached the pinnacle of freedom. He cares for nothing. This attitude gives nothing meaning and coincidentally everything meaning at the same time.
The most important thing that Dean gave Sal was the realization that life on the road was not for him. At the beginning of the excerpts we read, Dean is the character that originally gives Sal the bug. Dean causes Sal to set out on the road and begin his physical and metaphorical journey to find freedom. Sal is amazed by Dean’s carefree attitude and essence of freedom. By the end of the book, we see that Sal has settled down. He is married with children and no longer feels the ache to find “the pearl.” He has friends who are unlike the “idiot friends” he had before. Then we see Dean. Dean, who is still wandering. Dean, who “rode over three thousand miles over that awful land and never why he had come anyway, except to see me.” Dean has not settled down. He has not given in to the Levittown lifestyle. Yet, even though Sal sees Dean return to his life of freedom, Sal no longer aches to join him. Sal’s last thoughts of the book are of the adventures he had and of all that Dean has given him. Sal is thankful for the ways Dean drove him to find himself and find freedom. Yet, he is also content with the lifestyle he now lives.
1- Dean is the HOLY GOOF because of his care-free outlook on life. Sal says, ‘“... you’re silly about [life]. It never occurs to you that life is serious and there are people trying to make something decent out of it instead of just goofing all the time.’” This shows that Dean really lives for himself-- he marches to his own beat. In class, we talked about holiness and how it ties into this writing. Dean seems to have his own divinity within himself. It’s his adolescent composure and his silliness. On page 180, he says, “...we were going to do everything we’d never done and had been too silly to do in the past.” this shows his silliness and how it has affected his ability to achieve certain things. In addition to that, on page 176, sal narrates, “I heard Dean’s giggle across the house, together with the wails of his child.” This quote puts Dean into this child-like position, adding to his foolishness. This is part of his freedom and releases him from all ties.
ReplyDelete2- This quote shows Dean’s character in accurate terms. He has broken the chain from his final constraint, Camille. This is him letting go of any distractions that could stray him away from his goal of living for himself. He cares about everything because that’s what adventure is for. It’s to tame curiosity and spontaneity. Therefore, Dean is able to not care about anything that he desires not to. This is what, I think, is so desirable about him.
3- Sal seems to have gotten a taste of the desire of Dean that we discussed in class today. Looking out, it shows a sense of freedom and hope. On top of that, it also leaves a sense of mystery. The book ends with a big area visually. There is so much going on in such a huge span of land, but this is what Dean is all about. There is no specific place to zoom in on, so having such a great large image leaves this sense of the unknown. This prevents being tied down from a specific society, so I think this is what Sal has learned. Living in the unknown, not knowing what every next step is, is a very Dean thing. Sal has already predicted that his mind will drift back to Dean. This is Dean’s lingering influence.
I think that Dean is the Holy Goof because he is someone who people in the Beat Generation looked up to, but at the same time he was “silly”. “It never occurs to you that life is serious and that there are people trying to make simething decent out of it instead of just goofing all the time”. According to Galatea, Dean doesn’t take anything seriousley yet, Dean is a “BEAT—the root, the soul of beatific” and the Holy Goof. I think that Sal point about Dean being the ideal Beat is good, but Dean is still silly, and leaves his wives crying.
ReplyDeleteDean is part of this world and he has realized that he can’t change that fact. Now he has to do what he can to change the world and make it a place that we wants to live in. He does what he wants to do to be happy, laws, girls, friends don’t matter unless they make him happy.
I think that Dean gave Sal a sense of adventure. Sal went on a adventure with Dean, and learned how to perhaps be a Beat. Sal calls Dean, “the father we never found”, because Dean taught him how to have an adventure, be free, and have hope.
1. Galatea says that Dean has the inability to see that life is "serious" to some people and instead of trying to make it decent, Dean just goofs off all the time. I think that I do sympathize with Galatea's anger because Dean does mistreat women and continues to leave them, however, I think that Galatea's meaning of life greatly differs from Dean's. Galatea appears to believe that living a decent life or being a good person is about how you treat others. Although the women seem to think that Dean is worthless and has no heart, it can also be viewed that Dean made his life decent, simply because he is happy. To Dean, his life is worth living, and he finds value in every moment. Although Dean is "goofing" off, he is adventuring and his satisfied, something that the women seem to lack. Dean has a completely different lifestyle and perspective about life's meaning, and the women have a hard time understanding Dean's complexity as Dean does to understand them. I am not sure if Dean is worth elevating because he is selfish and only cares about himself. However, at the same time, Dean is an inspiration and hero to the beats because he doesn't care about anything or anyone's opinion and has the ability to only focus on himself. I think that Sal says that Dean is the HOLY GOOF to show that his goofiness is not something that should be rejected by others, but it is something that should be appreciated. Just like sex is holy to Dean, his sense of goofiness/ difference is holy to Dean and the other beats inspired by him. I think that HOLY GOOF describes how valuable and sacred Dean's personality and different point of view is. I think that holy is associated with religion so it is almost as if Dean's complexity of his mind is something that others look up to and worship. I think that it is important that Sal hears the negative comments of the women, but he still chooses to defend Dean. Sal thinks, "I suddenly realized that Dean, by virtue of his enormous series of sins, was becoming the Idiot, the Imbecile, the Saint of the lot." Sal directly sees the hatred toward Dean, but Sal shows loyalty to Dean, something that Dean often lacks towards others.I think that Sal defends Dean because he can appreciate Dean's madness when no one else can. Dean is the person that inspires Sal and introduced Sal to living life with adventure, so Sal cannot view Dean as a negative person.
ReplyDelete2. I think that this quote is saying that Dean doesn't care about superficial things, instead he cares about his principals of living without any restraints and doing anything to please himself. I think that although the women negatively criticize Dean for not caring about anyone, I think that Dean cares for people in the moment. When he spends time with someone, he devotes his full attention to them, which is part of the reason why people continue to go back to Dean, even when he is not loyal. Dean "belonged to the world and there was nothing he could do about it" meaning that Dean doesn't belong to anyone and isn't restricted by anything. Dean only belongs to the world, and it is up to himself to decide how he wants to live his life.
3. I thought it was interesting how at the beginning of last night's packet, Kerouac began to observe how the women were being treated. Kerouac writes, "I suddenly realized that all these women were spending months of loneliness and womanliness together, chatting about the madness of the men." Kerouac seems to show compassion to women and seems to understand that the women have suffered from how the beats constantly leave and the instability of their lives. I think that maybe Kerouac, although he greatly appreciated Dean's madness, realized that Dean was treating women was wrong. I wonder if maybe the reason why Kerouac settles down in a somewhat stable life at the end is because he wants to appreciate and respect women the way Dean never was able to. At the very end, Kerouac writes about how he will always think of Dean Moriarty. Although Kerouac has a stable life now, he will always have Dean's freedom and madness inside of him and will always be connected to Dean.
ReplyDelete1) Dean was THE HOLY GOOF because he didn’t take anything seriously. Life was all about fun for him. He only cared about himself. This was both a good and bad thing. Dean hurt a lot of people and he made really irresponsible decisions, but he also was very appealing in many ways; he was fun. He lived life to the fullest. He didn’t care what others thought of him, and nothing could hold him back. He was like a wild animal. Galatea said, “It never occurs to you that life is serious and there are people trying to make something decent out of it instead of just goofing all the time.” I understand where she is coming from, and her point is valid, but at the same time, why do we all need to take life so seriously? Dean is happy, and can’t that be enough? Dean just lives; why can’t that just be enough? If being serious is what makes life meaningful for you and what brings you joy, that is great, and you should do what makes you happy, but different things make different people happy, and there is no one single path to happiness. You should do what makes you happy as an individual, not just do what everyone else does because you think that if you have a stable life and are like everyone else, you will be happy. Dean does what makes him happy and he doesn’t feel any pressure to conform to cultural norms or to be like everyone else, and there is something really amazing about that.
ReplyDelete2) Dean fully lives in the moment. He doesn’t care about how his actions will affect him in the long term. He doesn’t care about the bigpicture. However, at the same time, in the moment, he cares about everything. Everything has meaning to him. A quote that shows this is, “‘Now Sal, let’s dg everything as we go along……’ He forgot about that in an instant and looked around blankly.”
3) Sal learned from Dean how to break away from the normal path, how to be wild, and how to be free. However, most people, including Sal, can’t sustain the crazy Beat lifestyle that Dean had. Sal ends up in Remi’s Cadillac, not with Dean. Sal found both the “Levittown lifestyle” and the “Beat lifestyle” appealing, and he was sort of caught in between. However, ultimately, by the end of the book, the reader can see that the Beat lifestyle was not realistic for Sal. This book makes the reader ask, Can you have both freedom and stability. Can you have both the Levittown lifestyle and the Beat lifestyle?
1.) Dean Moriarty is the Holy Goof because he always finds something funny. Even when a group of people who have known him for a long time are all telling him that he is the scum of the earth, he just giggles and does “a little dance” (p. 183). The Holy goof is exactly like Dean, they type of person to laugh at a funeral. Anything critical said to him could easily be brushed off by comedy because nothing real affects the Holy Goof. Sal doesn’t really defend Dean terribly well, but there’s not much to defend. He does say that everyone wants to know what Dean will do next, which is probably at least a bit true, but as for the question is Dean worth defending, I don’t think so. Dean doesn’t care either way what people think about him, so there’s no point in defending him if he doesn’t care. Also, these critics are simply trying to hold him accountable for the wellbeing of his wife and daughter, and he’s just laughing them off.
ReplyDelete2.) I think it means that Dean really cares deeply about life, but will still love his life no matter which way things turn. If people are mad at him, want to have sex with him, worship him, or travel with him, that’s all great because it doesn’t bother him. It helps explain his character because he’s absolutely manic about doing whatever he wants, giving in to every whim, and even when things turn bad he stays his same old self. The negative parts of life just roll right over his head due to his lack of caring about when things aren’t great.
3.) I think it says that Sal got what he originally wanted from Dean. He got his stories, enough to fill many books about Dean and Sal’s lives and adventures. Sal also got some of the same lust for life as Dean, he got his adventure, and now he can finally be ready to settle down in the Levittown lifestyle. I think that when Dean just walks off never to be seen again, I thought it was fitting. Their encounters were not small adventures, but one long meeting on the road, and one that ends as soon as they both reach their destination. They both head their separate ways, never to be seen again. Their parting reminds me of when the two smiling truckers drive off, and Sal realizes he’s never going to see them again. The same story is true here with Dean, they’re never going to see each other again, their relationship is over, and now they’re strangers again, their road interaction finished.
In the reading, Sal refers to Dean as the "holy GOOF". I think that he refers to him in that way because of the intense impact that Dean had on people and despite the questionable shallowness of his morality (in my eyes). Dean, despite his actions, is described as holy not just because of the impact and influence he had but also the extreme to which he had both. When I thinks about "holy", I am quick to relate it to the church. Like Dean, religion and the church are both impactful and influence others. In addition, Dean has these women who follow him around (like the way people do with a religion, God, or Jesus Christ) despite the fact that they know they are going to be hurt by them in some sort of way. They are religiously dedicated, making it a tighter bond. "Holy GOOF" expresses that Dean was nothing short of extreme.
ReplyDeleteIn the end of the reading, I think that the ending was very revealing. Although Sal does not end up living his life the way Dean does, I don't think he has anything against the experience he had with him. Although he didn't want the same lifestyle as Dean, Sal was able to break out of the "normal" Levittown lifestyle for a little. In a way, I am tempted to relate him to the way women continue to follow Dean. As though they weren't seeking a Beat lifestyle however they were seeking a temporary thrill- some fun. Something for them to break habit.