Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac follows some a group of San Francisco bums during the era of the Beats as they climb Matterhorn, enjoy nature, talk poetry, and philosophize about Buddhism and society and other things. The main theme in this book is the idea of nonconformity to society, which reflects the attitude of the beats at the time. To an outsider, their lifestyle seems awfully strange, but it is clear by the way the book is written that, to Kerouac, this offbeat lifestyle is normal. In the first chapter he says that they get around town by “hopping freight trains,” which reflects his unconventional lifestyle.
The biggest way the bums do not conform is that they do not participate in any consumerism or with the market, and they live poor with almost nothing. They don’t agree with the ways of the capitalist, money hungry society and they do not conform to joining the competition for wealth. There was one scene when Ray was mad that that woman was marrying a stock broker because he doesn’t like those kind of people who are so into money and productivity that they are out of touch with spirituality.
Another theme was spirituality, which went along with nonconformity. There was a constant acknowledgement of the world and nature being holy, which runs counter the mainstream way of acting where we are above nature and can utilize it and exploit it. For example, in the beginning when Ray and the other bums were hiking, Morley kept saying that the mountains were all Buddhas and Boddhisatvas. Later in the book Ray was talking to Christine and she told a story about how the Zen Master said the Buddha was a “dried piece of turd”(173) and then his disciple was instantly enlightened. This idea of spirit or spirituality in everything opposes the mainstream, coformist image of God in our country as a singular and definitive being.
Ray often stands on his head in search of the Buddhist “void” or primordial emptiness. I think this standing upside-down is a good metaphor for how the bums lived. In our world it is all about speed, efficiency and productivity. But the fundamental laws of Buddhism are about being in the moment, not having more than you need, and taking time to meditate and not be productive at all. Living like a true Buddhist is living counter to the ways of western, modern society because it means staying in one place rather than progressing really far out. Living like a “dharma bum” is following the Buddhist Middle Path: it is not having much so there is not much to lose, living simply so as not to evoke greed. In our society it is very hard to do what the Beats did and completely live against the grain of developed society. In Dharma Bums Kerouac described a group of people that truly lived as Buddhist wanderers in the modern time and did not conform to the progressive, productive nature of the West.
2 comments:
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I like your metaphor about how living like a bum is like standing on one's head. It turns the world upside down, or at least the western world where everything is about production. It is practically a "sin" in this country to practice "do-nothing" and along that same line hardly ever does one have the chance to sustain an upside-down position. When one goes into the head-stand position as in Dharma Bums, the blood is better able to circulate and is therefore able to alleviate pressure and arthritis from the joints. It reminds me of your final project rap on yin and yang, it is like the necessary change of perspective that completes the health and well-being of the whole. Productivity can be a good thing, as long as the do-nothing perspective is in tact to balance it and give it meaning.
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