Carolyn Cassady (1923–2013)
Author of Off the Road: My Years with Cassady, Kerouac, and Ginsberg
About the Author
Carolyn Cassady was born in East Lansing, Michigan on April 23, 1923. After attending Bennington College in Vermont, she was studying painting and theater design in a graduate program at the University of Denver when she met Neal Cassady in March 1947. She became pregnant, dropped out of the show more school, and became a member of the Beat Generation. She was as a character in Jack Kerouac's novel On the Road. She was the author of Heart Beat: My Life with Jack and Neal and Off the Road: My Years with Cassady, Kerouac and Ginsberg. Heart Beat was made into a 1980 film starring Sissy Spacek. She also worked as the artistic director of the drama department at the University of Santa Clara and as a portrait painter. She lapsed into a coma after an emergency appendectomy and died on September 20, 2013 at the age of 90. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Works by Carolyn Cassady
Associated Works
The Rolling Stone Book of the Beats: The Beat Generation and American Culture (1999) — Contributor — 167 copies
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Canonical name
- Cassady, Carolyn
- Other names
- Robinson, Carolyn Elizabeth (birth name)
- Birthdate
- 1923-04-28
- Date of death
- 2013-09-20
- Gender
- female
- Nationality
- USA
- Birthplace
- East Lansing, Michigan, USA
- Place of death
- Bracknell, England, UK
- Places of residence
- Nashville, Tennessee, USA
New York, New York, USA
Bennington, Vermont, USA
Denver, Colorado, USA
San Francisco, California, USA
Los Angeles, California, USA (show all 8)
Monte Sereno, California, USA
London, England, UK - Education
- Bennington College (BA|Drama)
- Occupations
- occupational therapist
author - Relationships
- Cassady, Neal (husband)
- Organizations
- Beat Generation
Members
Reviews
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Associated Authors
Statistics
- Works
- 7
- Also by
- 3
- Members
- 451
- Popularity
- #54,392
- Rating
- 3.8
- Reviews
- 4
- ISBNs
- 24
- Languages
- 6
When I was in my mid-teens, I simply adored Jack Kerouac's writing. I could not get enough of it. His books always promised a sense of freedom and symbolised a defiance of whatever convention seemed to bug me at the time. And how could I not love the writing that inspired so many of my other cultural heroes? It didn't come easy at that time to criticise Kerouac's writing for the sexism and blatant promotion of opportunism that is the foundation of Sal's and Dean's exploits.
Off the Road, which is the story of Carolyn Cassady, Neal Cassady's wife (well, one of them), offers a counterpart to the stories of Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassady. It holds up a mirror to the romanticised notion of the Beats and offers a somewhat more balanced insight to both the man who would be immortalised as Dean Moriarty in On the Road and the man who would create him as a literary hero.
Cassady gives quite an honest and to-the-point account of what lead her to become in volved with Neal Cassady, their ensuing relationship, and the events that have lead her to abandon the life of a society dropout. On occasion, her narration is funny, at other times it come across as bitter, though this arguably is justified.
What struck me most is the level of naivete that she displayed at the beginning of her relationship with Neal. There were quite a few moments that caught me rolling my eyes in disbelief. However, I guess that so would she having the benefit of hindsight. What Off the Road did really well for me was to portray the double standards that build the basis of On the Road - and which are not mentioned by Kerouac.
What I mean is that, as much as On the Road raves on about the aspirations of being an independent single-minded carefree human being, it never mentions that Dean/Neal and his friends relied heavily on the goodwill and hard work of their family and friends.
Review first added at BookLikes:
http://brokentune.booklikes.com/post/612292/off-the-road-twenty-years-with-cassa...… (more)