Jack Kerouac Book Covers

A selection of front covers of various editions of On the Road (click on thumbnail to enlarge)

"When I'm old, you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to study languages reading these."

(Kerouac's comment on the foreign editions of his books, 1966.)

UK Editions:

Penguin 2018 Penguin 2019

USA Editions:

German Editions:

Dutch Editions:

French Editions:

Italian Editions:

Spanish Editions:

Spanish (Catalan) Editions:

Others:

And finally, Jack

Kerouac's own

design for a book

cover in 1952.

It was never used -

until 2011 in

Slovakia.





This published version of On the Road was Kerouac's third attempt at writing his road novel.

The first was begun in November 1948 and featured hero Ray Smith. This was abandoned, and

a second version started in March 1949 with hero Ray "Red" Moultrie.



Further attempts were made in 1950 but proved to be false starts. It was only after Kerouac was

inspired by the letters of Neal Cassady in late 1950 that he sought to write in a similar free-flowing

style, the result of which was the famous scroll version of April 1951, which became the basis of the

published version.



Kerouac was, however, still dissatisfied with the result and, having been introduced to the concept

of "sketching" with words in the fall of 1951, he began working on yet another version of his road book,

completing it while staying at the Cassady home in San Francisco in the early months of 1952.



Originally titled Visions of Neal, the book, which included a rewrite of the main events described

in its forerunner, was only published in its complete form, as Visions of Cody, three years after

Kerouac's death, in 1973.







Compiled by Dave Moore

Thanks to Rod Anstee, Jerry Cimino, Jim Ferguson, Giorgio Gelmini, Niels Hansen, Thomas Kauertz,

Andrew Sclanders, Vojo Sindolic, Horst Spandler, Jeff Taylor, and Joe Tily for the use of their book cover images.





A selection of books by William S. Burroughs can be found here:



A selection of books by Neal Cassady can be found here:



A selection of books by John Clellon Holmes can be found here:



A selection of books by David Goodis can be found here:



More Kerouac book covers can be found here:



Visit the Kerouac Companion for definitive character keys and family trees, and more ...

