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
Mexico City Blues (2006; France)
Atop an Underwood (2000; Italy)
Lonesome Traveler (1979; France)
Book of Haikus (2004)
Wake Up: A Life of the Buddha (2008)
The Dharma Bums (2012; Slovenia)
Visions of Gerard (1991)
Visions of Gerard (1998; Czech)
The Dharma Bums (1982; Spain)
Selected Letters 1944-1969 (2016; France)
On the Road (1976; France)
The Dharma Bums (1959)
On the Road (2009; Romania)
Vanity of Duluoz (1982; Spain)
The Dharma Bums (1962; UK)
On the Road (2016)
Pic (1987; Canada)
Visions of Cody; Visions of Gerard; Big Sur (2015)
Maggie Cassidy (1978)
On the Road (2012; France)
Visions of Cody (1993)
Old Angel Midnight (1993)
The Dharma Bums (1993; Germany)
Satori in Paris (1966)
On the Road (2020; Mexico)
Lonesome Traveler (2018; UK)
On the Road (2009; Spain)
The Town and the City (2016; Italy)
On the Road (1997) – 40th Anniversary
On the Road The Original Scroll (2011; Germany)
Maggie Cassidy (2012; Poland)
The Dharma Bums (1983; Italy)
On the Road (2011; UK)
Satori in Paris (1966; UK)
The Subterraneans (1962; France)
Lonesome Traveler (2000; Spain)
On the Road (2011)
The Dharma Bums (2000; UK)
On the Road (1957)
Book of Dreams (1981)
The Subterraneans (1971)
The Sea is my Brother (2013; Poland)
On the Road (1991)
The Dharma Bums (1959; Italy)
Lonesome Traveler (1994; Italy)
The Dharma Bums (1961; Sweden)
Visions of Gerard (2012; France)
On the Road: The Original Scroll (2008)
Lonesome Traveler (1969; France)
On the Road (2012)
And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks (2008; UK)
On the Road (1990; UK)
Book of Dreams (2008; Czech)
On the Road (1999)
On the Road (1998; Portugal)
Dr. Sax (1977)
Satori in Paris (1971; France)
Lonesome Traveler (1973; France)
Desolation Angels (1966; UK)
The Dharma Bums (1976)
Book of Dreams (1963; Italy)
Pomes All Sizes (1999; Italy)
Visions of Cody (1995; UK)
Tristessa (1983; Canada)
The Dharma Bums (2016; Italy)
Lonesome Traveler (1962; UK)
Good Blonde and Others (1998; France)
Lonesome Traveller (1960; UK)
On the Road (2012; Sweden)
On the Road (2013; Brazil)
Lonesome Traveler (1993; Italy)
On the Road (1998; Romania)
Doctor Sax (2012; Spain)
Alone on a Mountaintop (Germany)
Vanity of Dulouz (1979; France)
The Dharma Bums (1994; Poland)
On the Road (1965)
The Sea is My Brother (2011; UK)
Desolation Angels (1978)
On the Road; The Dharma Bums; The Subterraneans (1993)
The Haunted Life (2014; UK)
Old Angel Midnight (1998; France)
On the Road (1978; Italy)
The Subterraneans (1995; Poland)
Big Sur (1963)
On the Road (1998; Iceland)
Mexico City Blues (2019; UK)
The Blues of Jack Kerouac (2019; Italy)
Desolation Angels (2012; UK)
Big Sur (2012; UK)
On the Road (1988; Bosnia)
On the Road (1959)
Lonesome Traveler (1970)
The Sea is My Brother (2014; Brazil)
The Subterraneans (1994)
Doctor Sax (1995; UK)
The Town and the City (1981; Italy)
Big Sur (1992)
The Subterraneans (1958)
On the Road (1974)
Tristessa (1992)
The Town and the City (2000; UK)
The Dharma Bums (2006)
Selected Letters (1940-1956) (2000; France)
Big Sur (2011)
On the Road (2012; Spain)
On the Road (1989; France)
On the Road (2002)
Book of Dreams (1995; Germany)
The Dharma Bums (2018; UK)
Lonesome Traveler (1965; Spanish)
The Dharma Bums (2007; Lithuania)
The Subterraneans (1984; Brazil)
And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks (2008; Netherlands)
Scattered Poems (1975; France)
The Dharma Bums (2012; Poland)
Big Sur (1966; France)
On the Road (1958; UK)
On the Road (1994; Hungary)
Maggie Cassidy (1993)
Dharma Bums (1988; Italy)
The Town and the City (1950)
On the Road (2007; France)
The Dharma Bums (2006; Poland)
Big Sur (1979; France)
Heaven (1977)
On the Road (2012; Hungary)
The Portable Jack Kerouac (2007)
Maggie Cassidy (1996; Czech)
Doctor Sax (2012; UK)
Doctor Sax (1962; France)
The Sea is my Brother (2019; Canada)
Visions of Cody (2001; Spain)
Mexico City Blues (1959)
The Dharma Bums (1974; France)
Big Sur (1981)
On the Road The Original Manuscript (2011; Brazil)
Maggie Cassidy (1960; UK)
The Dharma Bums (2009; Sweden)
On the Road (2002; Sweden)
The Dharma Bums (2001; China)
On the Road The Original Scroll (2009; Germany)
Visions of Gerard (1991)
Desolation Angels (1995)
On the Road, The Subterraneans, The Dharma Bums (2015; Mexico)
On the Road (2007)
Pic (1974; UK)
Tristessa (2019; UK)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (1998; Italy)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (2018; US)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (1960)
On the Road (2004; Slovenia)
Trip Trap (1998)
The Dharma Bums (2006; Israel)
Big Sur (2017; Germany)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (1996; Bilingual; Czech-English)
The Dharma Bums (2015; Korea)
Satori in Paris (1994; Czech)
On the Road (2004; Hungary)
The Subterraneans (1977)
The Dharma Bums (1963; France)
The Dharma Bums (1990)
On the Road (1989; UK)
Big Sur (1968; Italy)
On the Road The Original Scroll (2007; Spain)
Vanity of Duluoz (1969; UK)
Mexico City Blues (1976; France)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (1979; France)
On the Road (2008; Turkey)
Satori in Paris (2001; UK)
The Subterraneans (1966)
Desolation Angels (1975; UK)
On the Road (2016; Brazil)
Satori in Paris (1966)
Doctor Sax (1987; Germany)
On the Road (2007) – 50th Anniversary
Visions of Cody (1993)
Maggie Cassidy (1960; UK)
The Subterraneans (1997; Spain)
The Scripture of the Golden Eternity (2020; France)
Tristessa (2013; France)
The Town and the City (1983)
Road Novels 1957-1960 (2007)
Big Sur (1965)
Dr. Sax (1987)
Big Sur (1972; UK)
The Dharma Bums (2002; Czech)
On the Road; The Subterraneans; The Dharma Bums (2014)