Abstract:
As a student of the arts and humanities at a military institute, I have always identified as part of a sort of counterculture within this disciplined and conservative community. Alone in the lowest level of Preston Library, I often retreat to the company of the anti-heroes and outsider archetypes of literature and daydream about someday being inspired and enlightened like the authors and poets that claim that their experiences of exigence are nothing short of an extraordinary and divine phenomenon. My search for the source of creative inspiration and my fascination with counter-culture has intersected in the theory of liminality. Most writers have certain habits, or rituals, as part of their writing process. The research topic of this capstone essay is Jack Kerouac’s literature as liminal texts with particular attention to the motif of alcoholism. While the characters never explicitly refer to liminality, it is the in-between space described by Turner’s theoretical framework that the protagonists Sal and Dean pursue throughout the novel in the form of alcoholism, spontaneous thrill-seeking, and the setting of the open road devoid of regard for the restrictions of mid-twentieth century white picket fence America. Through consideration of On the Road within a liminal framework, I am hopeful for new perspective on creative expression.