Jack Kerouac Letter to Granville Jones with accompanying typescript

1961 April

Jack Kerouac (1922-1969) was an American author and poet who was recognized by academics in the 1960s for his writing about the Beat Generation. Granville (Pete) H. Jones (1932-1998) was a scholar who received his Columbia University graduate degree in the early 1960s. Jones's work was focused on contemporary poetry, and he began exchanging letters with Jack Kerouac about his writing.

After finishing his graduate work, Jones continued studying poetry and his correspondence with Kerouac. In 1961, Jones sent the author a draft of his essay, "Jack Kerouac and the American Conscience." Kerouac responded and shared his feedback and line edits for the essay. These exchanges with a living author would inform Jones' scholarship, and Kerouac is often directly quoted in Jones' writing.

Kerouac's work would continue to be the subject of poetry analysis, and Jones' work is an example of early scholarship on the topic.