A Comparison of On the Road and Crying of Lot 49 Essay -- comparison c

In both Jack Kerouacs, On the Road, and Thomas Pynchons Crying of Lot 49 the characters act in a aberrant manner outside of social norms. This in turn leads to a deviant sub-cultural group which competes with the institutionalized politics for power. Deviance in both novels is normally defined as a certain type of behaviour, such as an inebriated professor babbling on in a shell hall filled with students or a group of teenagers frolicking naked in a city park on a hot and bright afternoon. However, aberrancy can also encompass both ideas and attributes (Sagarin, 1975). The primary rationality of deviance rests in the reactions of observers, something becomes deviant because an individual, group or social club takes annoyance and reacts negatively (Cohen, 1966, Lofland, 1969). These negative reactions occur because onlookers interpret what they see and hear as being bad, insane, strange, immoral, non-conforming, or wrong. Negative responses do more than define deviance they s erve as mechanisms of social control and power. In examining these novels from a sociological perspective, both Kerouac and Pynchon examine combats between mainstream society and sub-cultural groups. The deviant behaviour, thoughts, and attributes observed from the characters at bottom the novels provide a strong argument for Austin Turks conflict theory of deviance, which examines power and cultural conflict as a terms for deviant behaviour. To begin, Austin Turks conflict theory of crime divides society into two groups those with power the authorities and those without power the subjects. In Pynchons novel The Crying Of Lot 49, this is realized by contrasting Pierce Inverarity, a California real estate mogul to those of low social economical class... ...sh-Catholic background, and his resemblance to a Fitzgerald hero, with a tragic death and foul frame floating in the wake of his dreams (153). However, both of the novels express those subjects living by values beyond the social norms as having some power to switch societal norms. By examining Turks theory of conflict between authorities and subjects, it becomes apparent the deviant behaviour observed from the characters in both novels is an influencing system of power to alter cultural and societal norms. WORKS CITED Dugdale, John. Thomas Pynchon allusive Parables of Power. New York St.Martin, 1990 Gomme, Ian McDermid. The Shadow Line Deviance and Crime in Canada. Toronto HBJ 1993. Kerouac, Jack. On The Road. New York Penguin books, 1955 Pynchon, Thomas. The Crying Of Lot 49. New York Harper & Row, 1966