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  • Published: 26 April 2012
  • ISBN: 9780141972015
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 112

Satori in Paris




Kerouac's classic tale of Buddhist Enlightenment, new to Penguin Modern Classics

This semi-autobiographical tale of Kerouac's own trip to France, to trace his ancestors and explore his own understanding of the Buddhism that came to define his beliefs, contains some of Kerouac's most lyrical descriptions. From his reports of the strangers he meets and the all-night conversations he enjoys in seedy bars in Paris and Brittany, to the moment in a cab he experiences Buddhism's satori - a feeling of sudden awakening - Kerouac's affecting and revolutionary writing transports the reader.

Published at the height of his fame, Satori in Paris is a hectic tale of philosophy, identity and the powerful strangeness of travel.

  • Published: 26 April 2012
  • ISBN: 9780141972015
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 112

About the author

Jack Kerouac

Jack Kerouac was born in Lowell, Massachusetts in 1922. In 1947, enthused by bebop, the rebel attitude of his friend Neal Cassidy, and the throng of hobos, drug addicts and hustlers he encountered in New York, he decided to discover America and hitchhhike across the country. His writing was openly autobiographical and he developed a style he referred to as 'spontaneous prose' which he used to record the experiences of the Beat Generation. Among his many novels are On the Road, Maggie Cassidy, The Subterraneans, The Dharma Bums and Big Sur. He died in 1969.

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Praise for Satori in Paris

A remarkable ear for the cadences of a phrase or sentence, a sense of how to register in words the sheer, sweet flow of things

Guardian