Jack Kerouac

Here I was at the end of America - no more land - and now there was nowhere to go but back.

So shut up, live, travel, adventure, bless and don't be sorry

What is the universe but a lot of wavesAnd a craving desire is a wave_

Maybe that's what life is... a wink of the eye and winking stars.

Whither goest thou, America, in thy shiny car in the night?

Be in love with your life, every detail of it.

Great things are not accomplished by those who yield to trends and fads and popular opinion.

All our best men are laughed at in this nightmare land.

The only people for me are the mad ones: the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who... burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow Roman candles.

I made myself famous by writing 'songs' and lyrics about the beauty of the things I did and ugliness, too.

Mankind is like dogs, not gods - as long as you don't get mad they'll bite you - but stay mad and you'll never be bitten. Dogs don't respect humility and sorrow.

I hope it is true that a man can die and yet not only live in others but give them life, and not only life, but that great consciousness of life.

Paris is a woman but London is an independent man puffing his pipe in a pub.

Hell man, I know very well you didn't come to me only to want to become a writer, and after all what do I really know about it except that you've got to stick to it with the energy of a benny addict.

Man, wow, there's so many things to do, so many things to write! How to even begin to get it all down and without modified restraints and all hung-up on like literary inhibitions and grammatical fears...

The only people for me are the mad ones the ones who are mad to live mad to talk mad to be saved . . . the ones who never yawn and say a commonplace thing but burn burn burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars.

A scene should be selected by the writer for haunted-ness-of-mind interest. If you're not haunted by something, as by a dream, a vision, or a memory, which are involuntary, you're not interested or even involved.

Scribbled secret notebooks, and wild typewritten pages, for yr own joy