The Duluoz Legend was a legend of the author Jack Kerouac’s own devising. It was to be an autobiographical story that encompassed all of his life’s works. Duluoz was Kerouac’s way of creating a semi-fictional, semi-truthful narrative within which he wrote about his life adventures. In Kerouac's writings, he often chose the elements he liked most about himself and his friends as subjects, avoiding the less savoury aspects of their characters. Thus it was his intention through his writing he sought to actively create his own legend and legacy well he still lived. This piece is a homage to Kerouac in all of his different forms: the good, the ugly, the religious, the misogynist, the poet, the scholar, and the drunk.
In preparation for writing Duluoz I read three different books by Kerouac; On the Road, Dharma Bums, and Big Sur. I was surprised to find that each book shows a radically different style and philosophy for Kerouac, each showing what sort of mental state the author was in at the time of writing. I tried to emulate these shift in thinking by loosely basing each section of my Duluoz on one corresponding book.

The first few minutes of Duluoz are an exposition. An ostinato stays consistent through the organ part, clips from an interview outline the concerns of beat poets as a whole, and a protestor voices his concerns about bourgeois society. A recording of Kerouac reading his own poetry soon enters to accompany a build up. The first sign that something could be wrong in Kerouac’s legend is the entry of the saxophone in the “wrong” key. The organ cuts out for a bar before coming back in thunderously with a chorus effect added for distortion. This section closest resembles Kerouac’s state when he wrote his book Big Sur. As the character of Kerouac descends into alcoholism he alternatively attempts to fight it and accept it, shown by the conflicting and harsh samples chosen. The next section is based off of the more religious side of Kerouac, which is the focus of his book Dharma Bums. The organ holds a minor 6th in the left hand, well the right hand weaves an exotic scale through it. The lack of resolution of this suspended interval shows the struggle of suffering or “Dukkha” in Buddhism. This suffering chord ends abruptly, showing the acceptance of suffering as a natural fact. The final section is based on a song recorded by Kerouac in his bedroom entitled On the Road. The organ harmonizes Kerouac’s melody while getting triumphantly higher. Other samples from earlier in the piece reappear, such as poetry, and the protestor. The saxophone reappears, but this time the key of the organ matches up with the saxophones. All of the parts build to a climax before steadily fading out one by one. Eventually all that is left is Kerouac reading the last lines of On the Road, “I think of Dean Moriarty, I think of Dean Moriarty” before even that fades out.