The character of Sal Paradise, in the novel On the Road by Jack Kerouac, is a complex fusion between imaginary and real. Kerouac created Sal in his own image and used him as a tool to shed light on the state of America in the aftermath of World War II. Sal is a sort of modern picaro, but with a beat spin. Though he travels across the underbelly of America, he sees no evil. Sal Paradise's beat part shows him the light of God in everything he encounters. This unique combination of the picaresque and the romantic allows the reader to gain a new perspective on the America of Sal Paradise's time. Sal Paradise shows us the scum of the world through rose-colored glasses, digging it to the core. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay When we first meet Sal, he has already developed many of the traits of the picaro. Although he is in his mid-twenties, Sal still lives with his aunt, who supports him financially. He's an unpublished writer, which more or less means he's unemployed. He is divorced. His time is spent in bars and apartments with cold water. This irresponsibility, the skirting of society's margins, and financial instability are all typical of the picaro. Sal immerses himself in the adventures of criminals like Dean Moriarty because, as Sal says, "The only people for me are the crazy ones, the ones who are crazy for living, crazy for talking, crazy for being saved, wanting everything at the same time." at the same time, those who do not yawn or say banal things, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous exploding yellow Roman candles. This desire to follow in the footsteps of those who Sal believes are truly living life will later prove to be the driving force behind his behavior and his constant need to be on the go. It is out of a desire for experience that Sal sets out on a journey, taking another step in his development towards the picaresque. This action serves to both divide the book into sections and further illuminate Sal's character. It is the long road trip that shapes Sal's life – and the novel as well. This clearly fits into the picaresque tradition of the antihero character on a journey that takes him to the fringes of society. The fact that Sal undertakes these journeys does not in itself constitute picaresque behavior. The situations that Sal finds himself in and the people he meets along the way, along with Sal's behavior in these situations and towards these people, are what come together to form a novel in the picaresque tradition. A picaro is a mischievous nomad, scavenging the world for the necessities of life and living only to please himself. Sal Paradise fits this bill perfectly. Hop from New York to Denver to San Francisco to New Orleans to Mexico and everywhere in between. He barely gets by on these trips, supplementing his veteran's benefit checks with money from his aunt and various other friends and women he meets. He stays in the homes of acquaintances, pushing relationships to the breaking point before disappearing, only to return again once old grievances are forgotten. He only takes work haphazardly, working in security with Remi Boncoeur or publishing pieces of writing. Stealing is only out of the question when he can support himself without doing so. As Remi Boncoeur says while Sal lives with him: “We need to reduce the cost of living.” Sal does all of this so he can be free to pursue what truly motivates him: the art of gaining experience. Over the course of the novel Sal leads multiple lives, each a sort of unique and singular "episode". Sal immerses himself in the lives of others and stays there until he feels he has come to understand the essenceof their being. Then he leaves, going in search of other life experiences as a leech. He cares little about the havoc he causes on the people he leaves behind or where he will end up next. Life experiences are what Sal really wants. His picaresque journey is not based on the need to survive. Sal could just stay home with his aunt and be perfectly taken care of. The driving force behind Sal's development as a picaro is his hunger for knowledge of lives he hasn't known. He travels the country to consume this knowledge and once he has incorporated these new experiences into himself he moves forward. These attempts would appear to have been preceded by a similar lifestyle led by Old Bull Lee. Sal looks up to Bull as an older, wiser friend and his life of learning: "What he considered and called the 'facts of life,'" made a great impression on Sal. It is with reverence that Sal says, “He spent all his time speaking and teaching others. Jane sat at his feet; Me too; also Dean; and Carlo Marx had done the same. We had all learned from him. What Sal learns from Old Bull Lee is that life is full of truths for those who go looking for them. Sal's road trips are his way of emulating this hero and master of the beat generation. The clearest example of Sal's utter heartlessness and constant desire for new experiences comes when he abandons Remi and Lee Ann and meets Terry at the bus station. The time spent with Terry is as close as Sal comes to settling in one place during the novel; Sal's life with Terry is as close to a normal relationship as you can get. Everything about their relationship is compressed into a short amount of time, but we're given an important look at how Sal functions during this particular adventure. Two incidents that occur during Sal's stay with Terry show us how Sal perceives himself and how he attempts to assimilate the people he encounters into his perceptions. The first incident occurs when Sal picks cotton in the field to earn money to feed his “family.” He sees an old black couple harvesting in the fields with him and begins to imagine their ancestors doing the same work decades earlier. Soon he can imagine himself the way he sees the black couple. He comments that he has found his life's work. Later, back in the tent with Terry and Johnny, he says, "Sighing like an old Negro cotton picker, I lay down on the bed." After a day of work picking cotton, Sal can already imagine himself as a world-weary field worker. Soon after Sal becomes disillusioned with picking cotton and wires coming home to his aunt demanding more money. The other incident occurs after a group of Okies lynch a man near the camp where Sal is staying with Terry and Johnny. Sal says, “From then on I carried a big stick with me in the tent in case they noticed us Mexicans ruining their trailer camp a Mexican of course; and in a certain sense they are. Here Sal once again shows his need to assimilate into cultures he barely understands. He truly believes that a few weeks of living with Terry has transformed him into a true Hispanic, that everything he will ever need to know about being Mexican has already been accomplished. at your disposal in this short time. A few days later, Sal has already gained the one thing he was truly looking for in his relationship with Terry: the belief that he fully understands the life he lives and the experiences she goes through. he had. Terry becomes just another character in the sea of ​​faces Sal encounters across the country: nothing more. The search for personality and experience is foreshadowed early in the novel, when Sal stops at Des.”