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The Railroad Earth Summary

Decent Essays

In the poem “The RailRoad Earth” Jack Kerouac, a pioneer of the Beat Generation, narrates his daily life as a railroad worker in the 1960’s. He begins his story in an alley behind the Southern Pacific Station anticipating the coming commuter frenzy at the station. He offers a unique perspective as a bystander that looks upon the city and the two conflicting cultures that divide it. He puts on display not just the everyday hustle and bustle of corporate America, but exposes the low-down and dirty underbelly of the city. He uncovers a layer to the city that is deeper than its corporates exterior. One of poverty and hopelessness that swallows the city like a pothole yet ultimately lets light to a valuable idea of freedom and self-expression. In his poem “The RailRoad Earth”, Kerouac presents the real San Francisco. He disregards the city’s fancy and sophisticated corporate image that many believe it to be for the real and raw, poverty stricken city it is.
In fact the corporate exterior is composed of commuters, who are not native to the city, while the soul of the city lies in the hands of the homeless and low-income people of color who actually live there. These commuters are businessmen who come from the “railroad earth”, the outside lands connected to the city by the railroad. The men of the “railroad earth” manifested in San Francisco because of the trains, buses, and cars that merely pass through the city. Just like the railroads that pass through San Francisco on route

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