-no girl had ever moved me with a story of spiritual suffering and so beautifully her soul showing out radiant as an angel wandering in hell and the hell the selfsame streets I'd roamed in watching, watching for someone just like her and never dreaming the darkness and the mystery and eventuality of our meeting in eternity.
Jack KerouacItโs a sort of furtiveness โฆ Like we were a generation of furtive. You know, with an inner knowledge thereโs no use flaunting on that level, the level of the โpublicโ, a kind of beatness โ I mean, being right down to it, to ourselves, because we all really know where we are โ and a weariness with all the forms, all the conventions of the world โฆ Itโs something like that. So I guess you might say weโre a beat generation.
Jack KerouacIsn't it true that you start your life a sweet child believing in everything under your father's roof? Then comes the day of the Laodiceans, when you know you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, and with the visage of a gruesome grieving ghost you go shuddering through nightmare life.
Jack Kerouac