POST-MODERN FICTION
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reflex of the circumstances of mass society. They are suffering from
psychic and social disturbance: and as far as that goes, they are
right-there is much in American life to give one a pain. But they
have no clear sense of why or how they are troubled, and some of
them seem opposed in principle to a clear sense of anything. The
"angry young men" in England, even if their protest will prove to
be entirely opportunistic and momentary, can say what it is that
hurts. The San Francisco writers fail to understand, as Paul Good–
man has remarked, that
It is necessary to have some contact with institutions and people in
order to be frustrated and angry. They [the San Francisco writers] have
the theory that to be affectless, not to care, is the ultimate rebellion, but
this is a fantasy; for right under the surface is burning shame, hurt
feelings, fear of impotence, speechless and powerless tantrum, cower–
ing before papa, being rebuffed by mama; and it is these anxieties that
dictate their behavior in every crisis.
These writers, I would contend, illustrate the painful, though
not inevitable, predicament of rebellion in a mass society: they are
the other side of the American hollow. In their contempt for mind,
they are at one with the middle class suburbia they think they scorn.
In their incoherence of feeling and statement, they mirror the in–
coherent society that clings to them like a mocking shadow. In their
yearning to keep "cool," they sing out an eternal fantasy of the shop–
keeper. Feeling themselves lonely and estranged, they huddle together
in gangs, create a Brook Farm of Know-Nothings, and send back
ecstatic reports to the squares: Having a Wonderful Time, Having
Wonderful Kicks! But alas, all the while it is clear that they are
terribly lost, and what is more pitiable, that they don't even have the
capacity for improvising vivid fantasies. As they race meaninglessly
back and forth across the continent, veritable mimics of the American
tourist, they do not have a Wonderful Time. They do not get happily
drunk, many of them preferring milk shakes and tea; and their
sexual revelations, particularly in Kerouac's
The Subterraneans,
are
as sad as they are unintentional. They can't, that is, dream themselves
out of the shapeless nightmare of California; and for that, perhaps,
we should not blame them, since it is not certain that anyone can.
No wonder, then, that in Kerouac's novels one is vaguely aware
that somewhere, in the unmapped beyond, a society does exist: a so-
