"Tangier and Kerouac's Oriental Experience in Liminality"
Résumé
In her article "Tangier and Kerouac's Oriental Experience in Liminality" Peggy Pacini discusses Kerouac's production derived from his Tangerian experience. Since the Tangier narratives have no existence of their own in the Duluoz Legend and are included in larger volumes about traveling and passing through, Pacini examines how this production cohered within the entire Legend and the terminology and world vision Kerouac had already fashioned. Focusing on two texts, "Big Trip to Europe" and "Passing through Tangiers, France and London," Pacini considers Kerouac's and his alter ego Duluoz's visions of Tangier and their journey to Tangier as many thresholds or liminal moments that eventually culminate in another rite of passage in their Beat experience. Within the framework of the Legend and of Kerouac's cosmology and imagery, Pacini addresses what has been overlooked in Kerouac's Tangier experience and how his encounter with the city is translated in his narratives. She examines several passing through experiences as described in Kerouac's and Duluoz's journeys to Tangier as revelations concerning their art and vision of the world while measuring them against a sense of lost innocence and the imperative to get along in their spiritual, artistic, and traveling quests.