The Americans INTRODUCTION BY JACK KEROUAC when the sin is hot on the strets and the music comes out ofthe jukebox or om a near= by Faners hae’s what Robert Frank has capeated in eremendous photographs taken a he eaveled on the road around practically forty-eight sate in an ld used car (on Guggenheim Fellowship) a wih ehe agility mystery, genins, snes and tran ie secrecy ofa shadow photographed scenes that hhave never been seen before on fil, For this he will definitely be hailed a6 a great artis in is el, knowing any mote whether jukebox is sadder than a coffin, That's because he's always eaking pi Alice seeing chese pictures you end ap finally tures of jokebores and caffine ~ and intermediary steric like the Negro priest squatting under- neath che bright liquid belly mer of the Missispp {at Baton Rouge for some reason at dusk of eanly dhs ith a white snowy cross and secre ean tions never known outside the bayou = Or the pic ture of chair in some cafe withthe sun coming i the window and seting onthe chairin a holy halo never thought could be caught on fil sich less described in its best visual entirety in words “The humor, the sadnes, the EVERYTHING- ness and American-ness ofthese picture! Tall hin cowboy tolling bute outside Madison Square Gar- Alen New York for rodeo season, sad, spindly, unbelievable ~ Long shot of night road arrowing forlorn into immensties and Mat ofimposible-to- believe America in New Mexico ander the pris- ‘one's moon — under che whang whang guitar star ~ Haggard old froway dames of Los Angeles lean Jing peeting out the ight front window of Old Paw's ear on a Sunday gawking and critciing to ‘exphin Amerika co litle children inthe spattered tack seat — tattooed guy deeping on gras in park in Cleveland, snoring dead to the world on a Sunday afternoon with too many balloons and i boats ~ Hoboken in the winter, platform fall oF politicians all ordinary looking til suddenly atthe far end tothe right you se one of them pursing his lips in prayer politico (yawning probably) noe a su caret - Old sn standing bestant with oldman Mad- American fag canopy in old cane under ol steps long since torn down Thawed car seat in fantastic Venice California Irckyard, I could sie in i and sketch 30,000 words (as eailzad brakeman I rode by such backyards pod) (empty tokay bottles inthe palm weeds) ~ Robert picks up evo hic hikers and ets them dive the ar, at night, and people look at their two faces looking grimly onward into the night (Visionary Indian angels who were visionary Indian angel says Allen Gis berg) and people say “Ooo how mean they Iook™ but all they want to dois arrows om down that road and gerack t the sack - Robert's here tell usso ~ St Peterburg Floris the retired old coders on 3 ‘bench in the busy mainsreet leaning on thei canes and talking shout social securiey and one incredible 1 chink Seminole half Negro woman pulling on her cigarette with thoughts of her own, as pure picture asthe nicest tenor sol in see ‘As American 4 picture ~ the faces don't edito- rilize or evticize or say anything but "This isthe sway weate in rea fe and ifyou don ike it don't know anyehing about it 'eause I'm living my oven Jie my way and may God bless us al, mebbe" it we deserve it” leaning out of the old st Othe lone woe of Lee Lucien, a basket pitty- haw.‘What a pocm thisis, whar poems can be writ- ter about this hook of pictures some day by some x high by candlelight bending lover them describing every gray mysterious de= tail, the gry film chat caught the actual pink juice of human kind, Whether Ys the mille of Invmankind meant, makes no difference when you look a 1, oFhumian-kindnes, Shakespeare these pictures. Better than a show, Maroad driving men ahead ~ the mad road, lonely, leading around the bend! into the openings of space toward the horizon Wasatch sos prom= ised usin the vision of the west, spine heights atthe ‘worlds end, coast of blue Pacific starry night — rpobone hal-banana moons sloping in the angled ight sky, he torments of grea fo the huddled invisible insect im the car racing ‘onward, illuminate = The tw ex, the drag the ‘bate, the star, the dra the sunflower in the grant ~ orangebutred west lands of Arcadia, Forlorn sands ofthe folate earth, dewy exposures to infinity in back space, home of the ratlesnake and the sopher~ the level of the world, low and fa: the charging rete mute unvoiced road keening in a Seizure of tarpaulin power into the route, Abulous plot: ofandowners im green unexpected, ditches by the side ofthe road, a Hook. From hereto Elko long dhe level of this pi poles {can soe 3 bug pl svush, hitch yourself a ride heyond the fastest Fight erin, beat che smoke, find the thighs, spend parallel co telephone ing in the hot sin ~ the shiney, throw the shroud, kis the morning star in the morning gla ~ madroad driving men ahead, Pencil traceries of ur faintest wish in the tuavel ofthe horizon merged, nosey cloud obfisks ina dabble of speechless distance, the black sheep, clouds cling a parallel above the steams oF €.8.0. = serried Liede Misouri rocks haunt the badlands, harsh dry brow fil olin the moonlight sith shiny cow's a, telephone poles toothpick time, “dotting immensity” the crazed voyageur of the Jone automobile prstes forth hie eager insigni cance in noseplates& Tcenses nto the vst promise oflife, Drain your basins in oll Obie an che I= an and the Illini pans, bring your Big Muddy rivers thra Kars and the mudlands, Yellowstone Jn che frozen North, punch lake hoes in Florida and L.A, mise your cities inthe white plain, cast ‘your mountsins up, bedswze the west, bedight the west with brave hedgerow cli sing eo Prome- themn heights and fire — plant your prisons in the basin of the Utah moon — nudge Canadian roping lands that end in Arctic bays, putt your “Mexican ribneck, America ~ we'e going home, oinghome, Lying om his satin fame of death, Man black, mad mourners ing by couakea peek at Holy Face wo see what death like and de low in the tremendous Ifyou know what ‘the sutras say ~ Chicago convention with sleek fice ‘earnest wheedling confiding cigatholding union ‘bom fi as Neto and eager ax Cacsat inthe thunder. ‘ous beer crash hall leaning over to confide — Gaming able at Buse Montana with background election posters and litle gambling doodds to knock over. editorial page in itself (Gor shrooded in fey expensive designed tar= polian (t knew a truckdrver pronounced it “tar palin”) 0 keep sa0t of no-oot Malibu fom falling on new simonize jab as owner who is a ‘svo-dollaran-hour carpenter snoozes in-house with wife and rv, all under pa oes for nothingfn the cemeteral California night, ag, ack ~ In Idaho thiee erases where d cats crashed, where ‘that long thin cowboy just barely made ito Madi- son Square Garden as he was about a mile do the road then ~ “Ftd you 19 wit i the ear” sy people in America so Robert sneaks around and photographs Tle kids waiting in the ear, whether thre litle boys ina mosorama limousine, ompious & opiful, oF poor litde kids can't Keep their eyes ‘pen on Route yo Texas a 4 A.M a8 diel goes to the bushes and stretches - The gone monsters stand in the New Mexico flats under big sign ss SAVE the svete white baby in the black nur ses arms both of dhem bemused in Heaven, a pie= ture that should have been blown wp and hung i the ateet of Litle Rock showing love under the shy and inthe womb of our universe the Mather ~ And the tone! ‘hat women newer se, the shoeshine going om in eit picture ever made, the urinals sad eternity = ‘Wo, and blown over Chinese cometery fos crs in a San Francisco hill being hammered by potatopateh fog on a March night I'd sry nobody there but the rubber et Anybody docint like dhe pitchers dont ike potry, 36? Anybody dont like potry go home see Television shots of big hatted cowboys being toler- ated by kind horses. [Robert Frank, Swiss, snoberusve, nice, wih sha tle camera tht he ruses and snaps with onc hand he sucked a sid poem right out of America ‘onto fil, aking rank among the tragic poets of the world ‘To Robert Frank [now give this mesage: You got eyes ‘And U say: Tha litle ole lonely elevator gil looking up sighing in an elevator fll of blurred demons, whit’s er name & adres?