Roadscapes, a Sociopoetics of the Road

Book excerpt: How do we imagine the road? If the road inspires freewheeling adventure in the spirit of Jack Kerouac, it can also be a site of our vulnerabilities. This collection highlights the work of artists, writers, and filmmakers from the Anglophone world who have drawn upon the road as a cultural landscape. The road reveals our sense of curiosity, our anxieties, our sorrows, and our disquiet with modern technology or the power dynamics of class and gender. This volume, with a foreword by Jeremy Bassetti, host of the award-winning podcast “Travel Writing World,” brings together international researchers and writers, including two original poems by the French-New Zealander poet, Lynette Thorstensen. This book will be of interest to students and scholars interested in 20th and 21st century art and culture, particularly road narratives.