2019 Reprint of 1959 Edition. Full facsimile of the original edition, not reproduced with Optical Recognition software. "Set in the close-knit working-class French-Canadian community of Lowell, Massachusetts, Maggie Cassidy is a semi-autobiographical account of Kerouac's adolescence. The story is recounted through the teenage mind of the author's alter ego, Jack Duluoz, a high school athletics and American football star. Maggie Cassidy is a meditation on being in love and youthful innocence. A memoir of the fantasy-filled ...
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2019 Reprint of 1959 Edition. Full facsimile of the original edition, not reproduced with Optical Recognition software. "Set in the close-knit working-class French-Canadian community of Lowell, Massachusetts, Maggie Cassidy is a semi-autobiographical account of Kerouac's adolescence. The story is recounted through the teenage mind of the author's alter ego, Jack Duluoz, a high school athletics and American football star. Maggie Cassidy is a meditation on being in love and youthful innocence. A memoir of the fantasy-filled memories of adolescent years spent male bonding with his 'corner boys', recollecting on his mother's expectations and time spent with his father, it is above all an account of his first love, high-school sweetheart, Maggie Cassidy. The romantic relationship is adeptly portrayed as a pure, passionate, exuberant love, narrated with deep and profound insights. Towards the end of the book Jack moves to a school in New York on a sports scholarship, leaving Maggie behind in Lowell. The culmination of the story comes three years later when Jack, now a man, visits her there. With the passage of time and the resulting altered motives and desires, the innocence has been lost and the resulting liaison is unfulfilled. Perhaps the ending is illustrative of the nature of Kerouac's own adulthood relationships." Guy Portman's Blog. Though one of the author's less well known books, Maggie Cassidy is a captivating work that utilizes long sentences and a fluid narrative style - the hallmark of the experimental, spontaneous writing form, pioneered by Kerouac, the reluctant leader of The Beat Generation.
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Fine. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 198 p. In Stock. 100% Money Back Guarantee. Brand New, Perfect Condition, allow 4-14 business days for standard shipping. To Alaska, Hawaii, U.S. protectorate, P.O. box, and APO/FPO addresses allow 4-28 business days for Standard shipping. No expedited shipping. All orders placed with expedited shipping will be cancelled. Over 3, 000, 000 happy customers.
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New. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 198 p. In Stock. 100% Money Back Guarantee. Brand New, Perfect Condition, allow 4-14 business days for standard shipping. To Alaska, Hawaii, U.S. protectorate, P.O. box, and APO/FPO addresses allow 4-28 business days for Standard shipping. No expedited shipping. All orders placed with expedited shipping will be cancelled. Over 3, 000, 000 happy customers.
Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
Seller's Description:
Fine. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 198 p. In Stock. 100% Money Back Guarantee. Brand New, Perfect Condition, allow 4-14 business days for standard shipping. To Alaska, Hawaii, U.S. protectorate, P.O. box, and APO/FPO addresses allow 4-28 business days for Standard shipping. No expedited shipping. All orders placed with expedited shipping will be cancelled. Over 3, 000, 000 happy customers.
Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
Seller's Description:
New. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 198 p. In Stock. 100% Money Back Guarantee. Brand New, Perfect Condition, allow 4-14 business days for standard shipping. To Alaska, Hawaii, U.S. protectorate, P.O. box, and APO/FPO addresses allow 4-28 business days for Standard shipping. No expedited shipping. All orders placed with expedited shipping will be cancelled. Over 3, 000, 000 happy customers.
Kerouac's autobiographical novel "Maggie Cassidy" is set in his hometown of Lowell, Massachusetts in 1939. It is the story of a high school romance in all its innocence and sexual frustration. The book includes wonderful descriptive passages of winter in New England, of shabby urban tenements, of grizzled and failed adults, and of hope, love, and loss.
The book captures the yearnings of first love in its confusion and undirected passion. It talks about both how people change and how there are limits to the scope of their change. The perspective of the book is interesting and revealing. Kerouac, the grown writer, is recapturing something of the spirit of the first love of his youth. The story is mostly told in the first person in the voice of the adolescent. Then, abruptly at the end the voice shifts to the third person signalling, I think, the change from the perspective of youth to that of adulthood.
There is something poignant about the book in the description of a memory of pure love which doesn't fade, (think of the Buddy Holly song "Not fade away") and about the shift from innocence to overt sexuality. There is a deep conservatism in Kerouac for the familiar, the commonplace, and the local, something which is often overlooked by his critics and admirers alike. It comes through well in this book.
Many writers tend to become prisoners of their most famous books. In Kerouac's case, people frequently don't get past "On the Road". "Maggie Cassidy" is a book on a smaller, more conventional scale. In its own way, it is precious.
