On the Road
(Jack Kerouac)

Sal Paradise

Sal is the narrator of the novel. He idolizes his friend Dean and wishes he could have a bit of the madness that Dean has. He is not critical of the morally questionable things that Dean does, but is rather in awe and admiring of him.

Sal has a thirst for madness, as he sees in the other characters, but the only way he can find that madness in himself is if he is under the influence of drugs and alcohol. Sal feels as though he is only happy when surrounded by others and is decidedly different from Dean in that he does not want a physical relationship with a girl; he wants a soulful connection.

Sal grows as a person throughout the novel though never achieves the madness he so craves. He does, however, meet a girl and fall in love.

Dean Moriarty

Dean is a reckless, morally skewed drifter whose only meaningful relationships come from his friendships with men, rather than his intimate relationships with women. Dean is totally mad and has a thirst for knowledge that drives him to keep moving.

Time means a great deal to Dean, and he envies Gods because they have an understanding of time that he wishes he had. He hopes to someday achieve this God-like status and master time so he never runs out. He feels as though sex is the holiest thing on earth and, therefore, has many sexual relationships with women and fathers various children, though he never finds true happiness with any one woman.

Carlo Marx

It is hinted at that Marx may have a crush on Dean, as the real-life person he is based on (Allen Ginsberg) is openly gay. Carlo Marx is socialist, rather funny, and often dark. He writes poetry that is dark and sordid, and he is anything but light-hearted.

Sal believes that Carlo is the voice of reason in their friendship circle, as he is always looking for a reason behind the actions of Dean and the other characters who often act with reckless abandon. When the characters cannot, or will not, offer explanations for their actions it puts Carlo on the outskirts because he is the only one who is seemingly rational.

Bull Lee

Bull Lee is based on Kerouac’s friend William Burroughs who is also a beat writer. Bull is a drug addict who happens to be the wisest person in the novel, lending to the assumption that drugs offer knowledge, understanding, and enlightenment.

Bull seems to be the only person who truly understands how crazy Dean is. He tells Sal that he needs to get away from Dean as quickly as possible because he is getting madder by the minute only Sal does not see any harm in it, only intrigue. The fact that a drug addict would make such an astute observation only shows how far gone Dean really is.

Camille

Camille is Dean’s second wife, the one he eventually ends up with, and Sal’s favorite. Sal counts Camille as his favorite because she is the only one who seems to genuinely love Dean enough to hold out hope for him.

Dean repeatedly cheats on Camille, walks all over her, leaves her, and returns to do it all again, yet Camille is always there. She sticks around no matter what he does to her and seems to truly and unconditionally love him. Though Dean ends up with Camille at the end, the cycle of their relationship suggests that he will only cheat and leave her again.

Marylou

Dean’s first wife and the only one who actually knows and understands Dean. Marylou understands that Dean is crazy, totally mad, and she knows that she cannot hold on to someone like that.

Marylou cannot stay with Dean because while she understands his madness, she also understands that he is too mad for her, and they will never be happy together. Marylou is the only of Dean’s wives that is as sexually adventurous as he is, having no qualms with the idea of having sex with Sal while Dean watches them.

Remi Boncoeur

Remi is the center of conflict at the beginning and end of the novel. When Remi is introduced to the novel, Sal states that he stole his first wife from Remi. Later, Sal has a crush on Remi’s girlfriend LeeAnn, but he is not willing to get in between Remi and a girl again; also LeeAnn turns out to be money hungry and constantly berates Remi for having none.

Sal loathes Remi’s relationship and uses it as a blueprint for everything he does not want in his own relationship, just in case he ever gets into a meaningful one. Remi and Dean hash it out at the end of the novel because Remi is a rational human being who is not equipped to deal with a crazy person like Dean.

Sal is forced to decide between Remi and Dean, and he chooses Remi, though he does say that it was a particularly tough decision.

Sal’s Aunt

Sal’s aunt serves as a maternal figure throughout the novel. When Sal, Dean, and their various friends are on cross-country treks Sal’s aunt always gives them a place to stay and feeds them. She acts as their protector, often keeping them out of trouble despite their various wrongdoings. In one particular scene Sal’s aunt pays for a traffic ticket that the boys got to keep them from getting arrested, which they inevitably would have because they did not have money to pay it themselves. Sal lives with his aunt in New Jersey and on Long Island when he is not on one of his trips and she sends him money when he is on the road. She is uncommonly kind and supportive to Sal and his friends.

Roland Major

Roland is a friend of Sal’s who lives in Denver. While Sal is in Denver, he stays with Roland for a time. Major is a writer who enjoys frightfully dark literature like that of Ernest Hemingway. He has no respect for people who appear to be too artsy, possibly because those who try to hard usually aren’t.

Major is extremely uppity and quite the snob and has an interest in fine wines. He enjoys talking about how well-refined he is and has a problem with the rowdy behavior of Dean and his buddies. Major is a bit of a buzzkill for the other characters.

Ed Dunkel

Ed is a remarkably close friend of Sal and Dean and is married to a woman named Galatea. Ed treats his wife poorly though she stays with him regardless. He marries her only so she will fund the trip he is taking cross-country with the boys, and as soon as she does so he leaves her at a motel in Tucson.

Ed is exceptionally tall, not terribly bright, and Dean likes him because he will do anything Dean asks of him. Ed has certain visions that make him saintlike in Sal’s eyes, almost on the same level as Dean whom he idolizes.

Galatea Dunkel

Galatea is Ed’s newlywed wife whom he uses for money and has little respect for. She is extremely serious, uptight, and disapproving of Ed’s behavior, especially when he is around Dean and Sal. Galatea stays with her husband through some difficult situations and throughout various cases of him leaving her.

While many women are intimidated by Dean, Galatea is not. She is not afraid to tell Dean exactly what she thinks of him. Sal at first thinks of Galatea as a loser for staying with Ed regardless of his mistreatment of her, but eventually realizes she stays with him because she loves him, which Sal respects though he does feel sorry for her.

Terry

Terry is a Mexican migrant worker who Sal meets in California and spends a few months with. She has a son and an abusive husband who she is trying to escape from. Sal spends a lot of time in the fields with Terry and her family.

Terry and Sal do not have any real feelings for one another, but neither of them likes to be alone so they would rather be together. Sal mistakes companionship for love and the time they spend together is a delightful break from solitude for him. Sal, always striving to be more like Dean, abandons Terry after just a short amount of time, as Dean does with every woman he “loves”.

Inez

Inez is Dean’s third wife. Dean meets Inez in New York while he is still married to Camille and lives with her for a while. Dean leaves Inez after she has his child to go to Mexico with Sal but comes back to her once he is divorced from Camille.

Throughout Dean and Inez’s relationship, he cheats on her with Camille whenever he gets to San Francisco. Inez does not stand for the cheating, yet she marries him anyway. The day after they are married Dean decides to leave her for good and go back to Camille.

Jane Lee

Jane is the wife of Bull Lee and a Benzedrine addict. Sal, being on the search for the perfect woman and the perfect relationship dissects every relationship she sees, and he believes that Bull and Jane have the best one he has seen.

The Lees appear to have a decidedly soulful connection with one another and spend all of their time together, never talking about anything that has no meaning. They are both junkies so this could contribute to their connection. Sal describes in detail how Jane’s addiction has caused her body to decay over years of abuse.

Victor

Victor becomes a close friend of Sal, Stan, and Dean while they are Mexico. Victor does not speak English, but that does not stop him from becoming close friends with Dean, because Dean can make friends with anyone and does not need verbal communication to do so.

Sal has a dream that Dean can communicate with Victor through a psychic connection. All three boys become friends with Victor, but Dean’s connection to him is the strongest of all. Victor provides the guys with hookers and drugs while they are in Mexico.