The Voice Is All: The Lonely Victory of Jack Kerouac

WAMC Northeast Public Radio | By Joe Donahue

Published September 19, 2012 at 10:10 AM EDT

In The Voice Is All: The Lonely Victory of Jack Kerouac

, Joyce Johnson, author of her classic memoir, Door Wide Open, about her relationship with Jack Kerouac, peels away layers of the Kerouac legend to show how, caught between two cultures and two languages, he forged a voice to contain his dualities. Johnson explores how Kerouac’s French Canadian background enriched his prose and gave him a unique outsider’s vision of America and she tracks his development from boyhood through the phenomenal breakthroughs of 1951 that resulted in the composition of On the Road, followed by Visions of Cody.

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Joe Donahue

Joe talks to people on the radio for a living. In addition to countless impressive human "gets" - he has talked to a lot of Muppets. Joe grew up in Philadelphia, has been on the area airwaves for more than 25 years and currently lives in Washington County, NY with his wife, Kelly, and their dog, Brady. And yes, he reads every single book.

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