On the Road Sadness Quotes

How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Part.Chapter.Paragraph)

Quote #16

I huddled in the cold, rainy wind and watched everything across the sad vineyards of October in the valley. My mind was filled with that great song "Lover Man" as Billie Holiday sings it; I had my own concert in the bushes. "Someday we’ll meet, and you’ll dry all my tears, and whisper sweet, little things in my ear, hugging and a-kissing, oh what we’ve been missing, Lover Man, oh where can you be . . ." It’s not the words so much as their great harmonic tune and the way Billie sings it, like a woman stroking her man’s hair in soft lamplight. The winds howled. I got cold. (I.13.45).

Sal identifies a sad and poignant core in the tune of a song. Later, Dean will tell him that the IT of a song is NOT in the tune, rather it is in something else.

Quote #17

I plodded along in the ditch. Any minute I expected the poor little madman to go flying in the night, dead. We never found that bridge. I left him at a railroad underpass and, because I was so sweaty from the hike, I changed shirts and put on two sweaters; a roadhouse illuminated my sad endeavors. A whole family came walking down the dark road and wondered what I was doing. Strangest thing of all, a tenorman was blowing very fine blues in this Pennsylvania hick house; I listened and moaned. It began to rain hard. A man gave me a ride back to Harrisburg and told me I was on the wrong road. I suddenly saw the little hobo standing under a sad streetlamp with his thumb stuck out - poor forlorn man, poor lost sometime boy, now broken ghost of the penniless wilds. I told my driver the story and he stopped to tell the old man. (I.14.3)

The music that is The Blues serves as a fitting background for Sal’s wanderings.

Quote #18

"Ah now, man," said Dean, "I’ve been digging you for years about the home and marriage and all those fine wonderful things about your soul." It was a sad night; it was also a merry night. In Philadelphia we went into a lunchcart and ate hamburgers with our last food dollar. (II.2.3)

This moment with Dean very clearly epitomizes the dichotomy of Sal’s emotions. Quite simply, the night was both sad and merry. And Sal sees no contradiction in the two.