THE DAILY BEAT: Kerouac + Hemingway = opportunity

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Kerouac + Hemingway = opportunity

Ernest Hemingway was an important literary influence on Jack Kerouac. Indeed, I've loved Hemingway since high school, long before I'd ever read Kerouac.

They both loved cats.

As of yesterday, over 3,000 Hemingway documents from the Hemingway Museum at Finca Vigia in Havana (read more here) are available digitally to researchers and fans.

It got me wondering if the two ever corresponded. According to Gerald Nicosia, in Memory Babe: A Critical Biography of Jack Kerouac (1994), they did meet in late 1943:

At one cocktail party in the Village Jack met Ernest Hemingway. After addressing him as "Papa," Jack proved too tongue-tied to make much of an impression on his formal idol (p. 112).

Perhaps a letter ensued?

There is a fee for accessing the Hemingway archives, but I'm going to look into it. You never know . . . .

2 comments:

Tom said...: Wow- that is interesting and worth checking out, from my point of view.; January 7, 2009 at 3:05 AM
Rick Dale, author of The Beat Handbook said...: I have failed so far to find contact information for the museum, but I will keep trying.

The lone beatnik in Winston-Salem? That sounds truly lonely!; January 7, 2009 at 9:09 AM

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Reviews of The Beat Handbook

Gerald Nicosia, author of the acclaimed Kerouac biography Memory Babe, said The Beat Handbook is "full of Jack's heart."

Jared Randall, author of the excellent book of poetry, Apocryphal Road Code, said this about The Beat Handbook: "Sometimes a book comes along at just the right time. In my wandering pack of experiences, I find they often do. Enter The Beat Handbook by Rick Dale."

Kenneth Morris, Kerouacian extraordinaire, said this:
"I just finished reading Rick Dale's beautiful utterance and call to action of Kerouac mind-set and zen sensibilities. It made me laugh and reflect on my own life and road I have naturally grooved into after absorbing the Kerouac canon. The road less traveled always had my name on it. And that has made all the difference. The Beat Handbook 100 Days of Kerouactions reaffirms the attitudes and ideology that made the Beats and Kerouac the important men of ideas that America (and the world) thirsted for, needed, and swallowed whole. Beautiful, absorbing, Top Ten whipsmart from my articulate, tender-hearted friend and fellow traveler. Highly recommended."