The Kerouac Book River is inspired by the legendary Merrimack and Concord rivers, which run through the author’s hometown of Lowell, Massachusetts. At the “source” of the river is the canon of first editions, beginning in 1950 with The Townand the City. Plentiful waters stir to rapids with Jack’s kinetic classic novel, On the Road, in 1957, and the current gains momentum with numerous tales drawn from a short life richly lived. Later editions surge and splash through high water on the way to the river’s mouth, which empties into the global ocean of readers.
While this cover art illustrates how graphic artists and designers visualized Kerouac’s writings, it also shows how Kerouac’s North American narratives and poetry, translated into a multitude of languages, have spoken to generations worldwide. The Kerouac Book River draws from the holdings of the Jack Kerouac Collections at the UMass Lowell Libraries’ Center for Lowell History, as well as online resources. The presentation of these images is not for commercial use, as copyrights may reside with the publishers or cover artists. If you have a Kerouac book cover you’d like to share, please use this site’s contact form.
First Editions
The Town and The City (1950)
On the Road (1957)
The Dharma Bums (1958)
The Subterraneans (1958)
Maggie Cassidy (1959)
Mexico City Blues (1959)
Visions of Cody Excerpts (1959)
Doctor Sax (1959)
Lonesome Traveler (1960)
Rimbaud (1960)
Tristessa (1960)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (1960)
Pull My Daisy (1961)
Book of Dreams (1961)
Big Sur (1962)
Visions of Gerard (1963)
Desolation Angels (1965)
Satori in Paris (1966)
Vanity of Duluoz (1968)
Pic (1971)
Scattered Poems (1971)
Visions of Cody (1972)
Not Long Ago Joy Abounded at Christmas (1972)
Trip Trap (1973)
Old Angel Midnight (1973)
Heaven and Other Poems (1977)
Pomes All Sizes (1992)
Good Blonde & Others (1993)
Book of Blues (1995)
Selected Letters 1940-1956 (1995)
Some of the Dharma (1997)
Selected Letters 1957-1969 (1999)
Atop an Underwood (1999)
Orpheus Emerged (2000)
Book of Haikus (2003)
Departed Angels (2004)
Windblown World: The Journals of Jack Kerouac 1947-1954 (2004)
Beat Generation (2005)
Book of Sketches (2006)
On the Road The Original Scroll (2007)
San Francisco Blues (2007)
Wake Up: A Life of the Buddha (2008)
And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks (2009)
You’re a Genius All the Time (2009)
Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg: The Letters (2010)
The Sea is My Brother (2011)
Collected Poems (2012)
The Haunted Life and Other Writings (2014)
The Unknown Kerouac (2016)
Beat Painting (2018)
Later and International Editions
Dharma Bums (1988; Italy)
The Dharma Bums (2006)
On the Road (1998; Portugal)
The Sea is My Brother (2014; Brazil)
The Dharma Bums (1959; Italy)
Book of Dreams (1995; Germany)
Doctor Sax (2012; UK)
The Subterraneans (1981)
Orpheus Emerged (2012; Malaysia)
Dr. Sax (1977)
On the Road (2007) – 50th Anniversary
The Dharma Bums (1982; Spain)
Maggie Cassidy (1996; Czech)
Orpheus Emerged (2005)
The Sea is my Brother (2013; Poland)
On the Road (2004; Slovenia)
On the Road (1978; Italy)
Orpheus Emerged (2018; Italy)
Big Sur (2019; France)
The Dharma Bums (1974; France)
Lonesome Traveler (2000; Spain)
Satori in Paris (1994; Czech)
Doctor Sax (2007; France)
Visions of Gerard (2014; Brazil)
Lonesome Traveller (1968)
Pic (1974; UK)
Lonesome Traveler (2018; UK)
On the Road (1976)
The Town and the City (1981; Italy)
The Dharma Bums (1999; France)
On the Road The Original Scroll (2010; Italy)
Tristessa (1992)
Maggie Cassidy (1993)
Tristessa (1992)
Vanity of Dulouz (1979; France)
On the Road (1976; France)
Good Blonde and Others (1999; Italy)
On the Road (2010; Japan)
On the Road (2015; Brazil)
The Sea is My Brother (2011; UK)
On the Road (2007)
The Portable Jack Kerouac (2007)
Lonesome Traveller (1964; UK)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (1998; Italy)
The Subterraneans (1997; Spain)
Satori in Paris (1982; UK)
Lonesome Traveler (1962; UK)
The Dharma Bums (2016; Spain)
Tristessa (2021; Italy)
Tristessa (1978)
Dr. Sax (2012; Russia)
Satori in Paris (France)
The Subterraneans (1962; France)
Big Sur (1963)
Visions of Cody (1980; UK)
Book of Dreams (2000; Germany)
On the Road (2002)
The Dharma Bums (1963; France)
The Dharma Bums (1961; Sweden)
On the Road (2016; Spain)
The Subterraneans (1995; Poland)
On the Road (2012; Spain)
On the Road (2015; Greece)
Visions of Gerard (2012; France)
Big Sur (2017; Germany)
Maggie Cassidy (1978)
Satori in Paris (2007; Bilingual: French and English)
Visions of Cody (1993)
Doctor Sax (2012; Spain)
On the Road (1958; UK)
On the Road (2008; Turkey)
On the Road (1998; Iceland)
On the Road The Original Scroll (2007; Spain)
San Francisco Blues (1996; Italy)
Tristessa (2017)
Lonesome Traveler (1973; France)
Lonesome Traveler (1979; France)
On the Road (2012; Russia)
On the Road The Original Scroll (2016; Sweden)
The Town and the City (1950)
Lonesome Traveler (1970)
On the Road (2000; Macedonia)
On the Road (2002; Italy)
Lonesome Traveler (1980; France)
Dr. Sax (1987)
On the Road (1989; UK)
Road Novels 1957-1960 (2007)
On the Road (1998; Romania)
Lonesome Traveller (1960; UK)
Big Sur (1963; UK)
Satori in Paris (1966)
The Dharma Bums (1971)
On the Road (1990; UK)
Visions of Cody (1993)
The Dharma Bums (1962; UK)
The Dharma Bums (2012; Slovenia)
The Town and the City (1983)
Doctor Sax (1999; France)
On the Road (2016)
Tristessa (1989)
Alone on a Mountaintop (Germany)
The Dharma Bums (1976)
Satori in Paris (2010; Brasil)
And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks (2008; Netherlands)
On the Road (2010; Slovakia)
The Dharma Bums (2001; China)
Lonesome Traveler (1993; Italy)
Mexico City Blues (1976; France)
On the Road (2004; Norway)
Dr. Sax (1959)
Old Angel Midnight (1976; UK)
On the Road (2003; Romania)
The Dharma Bums (1983; Italy)
Desolation Angels (1990; UK)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (2001)
The Dharma Bums (2012; Poland)
Desolation Angels (1968; France)
Big Sur (2013)
Pic (1988; France)
Book of Dreams (1981)
Lonesome Traveler (1969; France)
On the Road The Original Scroll (2009; Israel)
Satori in Paris (2001; UK)
Lonesome Traveler (1993; Czech)
Visions of Gerard (1991)
The Dharma Bums (2015; Korea)
Mexico City Blues (2008; Mexico)
Big Sur (1992)
The Dharma Bums (2007; Lithuania)
On the Road (1997) – 40th Anniversary
Satori in Paris; Pic (1988)
On the Road (2004; Hungary)
Lonesome Traveler (1965; Spanish)
The Dharma Bums (2009; Romania)
Lonesome Traveler (1994; Italy)
On the Road The Original Scroll (2009; Germany)
On the Road (1961; UK)
Big Sur (2012; UK)
Tristessa (2019; UK)
Vanity of Dulouz (1994)
Atop an Underwood (2000; Italy)
Big Sur (1999; Portugal)
Tristessa (2009; Portugal)
On the Road (1990; France)
Doctor Sax (1984; UK)
The Dharma Bums (2006; Poland)
The Illustrated On the Road (2019)
On the Road: The Original Scroll (2008)
Vanity of Duluoz (1969; UK)
On the Road (1999)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (2018; US)
Old Angel Midnight (1993)
On the Road (2011; UK)
Satori in Paris (1966; UK)
Big Sur (2011)
Piers of the Homeless Night (2018)
The Dharma Bums (2002; Czech)
The Sea is My Brother (2012; Italy)
On the Road (2020; Mexico)
Mexico City Blues (1959)
The Subterraneans (1971)
On the Road (2012)
On the Road (1977; Spain)
Book of Dreams (1998; Brazil)
The Subterraneans (1977)
Desolation Angels (1978)
Book of_Haiku (2006)
On the Road (1957)
On the Road; The Subterraneans; The Dharma Bums (2014)
Big Sur (1966; France)
The Blues of Jack Kerouac (2019; Italy)
On the Road (1958; UK; 1st Edition)
On the Road (2016; Brazil)
The Dharma Bums (2004; Brazil)
Big Sur (1992)
Desolation Angels (1966)
Big Sur (2018)
Doctor Sax (2006; UK)
On the Road (2018)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (1996; Bilingual; Czech-English)