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Desolation angels

Jack Kerouac

1966366 pagesabout 6–8 hours
1966
first published
  • 1966Andre Deutsch · 366 pages · ENG
  • 1968Mayflower · 366 pages · ENG
  • 1969366 pages · ENG
  • 1978Putnam · 366 pages · ENGISBN 9780399503856
  • 1990Paladin · 397 pages · ENGISBN 9780586089071
  • 1995Flamingo · 397 pages · ENG
  • 1995Riverhead Books · 409 pages · ENGISBN 9781573225052
  • 2012Penguin Press/ClassicsISBN 9780141198262

Desolation Angels is a semi-autobiographical novel written by Beat Generation author Jack Kerouac, which makes up part of his Duluoz Legend. It was published in 1965, but was written years earlier, around the time On the Road was in the process of publication. According to the book's foreword, the opening section of the novel is taken almost directly from the journal he kept when he was a fire lookout on Desolation Peak in the North Cascade mountains of Washington state. Much of the psychological struggle which the novel's protagonist, Jack Duluoz, undergoes in the novel reflects Kerouac's own increasing disenchantment with the Buddhist philosophy with which he had previously been fascinated.

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