The Beat Goes On, Part 1

This month marks the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Jack Kerouac's On The Road, the novel that defined the Beat Generation.

The author's hometown of Lowell is paying tribute to its native son with poetry slams, jazz concerts, and a special exhibit, featuring a huge scroll on which Kerouac typed his entire manuscript.

Recently, the Boston Globe's Charles Sennott set out "on the road" to retrace Jack Kerouac's coast-to-coast odyssey.

All this week on WBUR's Morning Edition, Sennott takes us down the same highways and back roads that Kerouac traveled. His journey begins in a cafe on Lowell's Market Street, at a marathon reading of the novel on September 5th, the day the book was published a half century ago.