“Everything’ll be all right, desolation is desolation everywhere and desolation is all we got and desolation aint so bad.”
Jack Kerouac, Desolation Angels
Jack Kerouac, Desolation Angels
American and English editions are rarely identical. Obviously the English add the letter U to words like "color" and "labor." The titles might also diverge. For example, Craig Brown's inventive and magnificent biography of Queen Elizabeth II's tragic (but haughty) sister was published in the United Kingdom as Ma'am Darling: 99 Glimpses of Princess Margaret. The American edition was shortened to Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret. Nearly always the dust jackets are different, as it is the publisher that commissions the art on the cover.
Jack Kerouac's Desolation Angels was no exception to the rule. The dust jackets were strikingly (and thematically) different. This semi-autobiographical novel, an installment in Kerouac's Duluoz Legend series, was written around the time of the publication of Kerouac's most iconic novel, On the Road, in 1957. It languished as an underground title for nearly a decade until finally published in the United States in 1965 by Coward-McGann and in the United Kingdom in 1966 by Andre Deutsch. Which publisher designed the better jacket?
Jack Kerouac's Desolation Angels was no exception to the rule. The dust jackets were strikingly (and thematically) different. This semi-autobiographical novel, an installment in Kerouac's Duluoz Legend series, was written around the time of the publication of Kerouac's most iconic novel, On the Road, in 1957. It languished as an underground title for nearly a decade until finally published in the United States in 1965 by Coward-McGann and in the United Kingdom in 1966 by Andre Deutsch. Which publisher designed the better jacket?
American First Edition American Edition, Coward-McCann, Inc. (1965) | English First Edition English Edition, Andre Deusch (1966) |
Verdict
This is an easy call. The Pop Art design by the Irish artist Michael Farrell for the English edition is not only eye-catching; it is magnificent. How fun a poster-size version would be hanging on the wall of a midcentury home. Its design was very much of that moment. The realistic etching depicting scenes from the book in the American edition is also of that time period, but in a manner that does not translate in 2019, unlike the "retro" English edition. Part of the problem is that the style of the American edition became overdone, frequently imitated in cheaply produced movie tie-in mass paperbacks.
The only issue with the English edition is that it is not precisely of its time. Kerouac's Desolation Angels is set in the mid-1950s, and the Andy Warhol-inspired soup cans in the illustration did not explode onto the art scene until the early 1960s when they were exhibited at the Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles.
The only issue with the English edition is that it is not precisely of its time. Kerouac's Desolation Angels is set in the mid-1950s, and the Andy Warhol-inspired soup cans in the illustration did not explode onto the art scene until the early 1960s when they were exhibited at the Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles.
PURCHASE GORE VIDAL'S COPY OF "DESOLATION ANGELS"
The copy of Desolation Angels (English Edition) from the library of Gore Vidal (stamped "From the Library of GORE VIDAL), is available via the Nick Harvill Libraries website. Though Jack Kerouac was straight, he did have a minor dalliance with Vidal. Moreover, a character based upon Gore Vidal appears in Kerouac's Duluoz Legend series (though not this particular installment).
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