Editor’s note: Second in a three-part series of essays on Buddhism.

Jack Kerouac (1922-1969) has a rather large role to play in the Buddhist story. Like a lot of artists, thinkers and poets before him, Kerouac was a sort of “exemplary spirit.” Jack somehow personified the ambitions of an era. Or to use an Emersonian turn of phrase: Jack Kerouac was a “representative” man. He was representative for a few reasons.

First, Kerouac epitomized a new reaction to American conformity. The arc of Buddhism followed the arrow of political upheaval in the 1960s. We all know the stories about Jack walking to his favorite bar in house-slippers and getting completely smashed in the middle of the day – not exactly an appropriate middle-class behavior. But it wasn’t the same thing as you or I getting smashed in the middle of the day. For Kerouac carried the sensational burden of talent combined with saintly wisdom.

Second, Kerouac’s “wanderings” became “our” wanderings – and to a certain extent this is still true today. Most people have at least heard of “On the Road” if they haven’t actually read it. Just look at the current obsession with RVs, trailers and campers. One is tempted to shout from the overpass, “Where are you rushing? Where are you going?” I can hear their echoed chorus in unanimity: “Las Vegas! Santa Fe! San Francisco!” The itinerary is a black scribble on the hearts of men, a geometry of confusion.

“Wandering” lends itself well to a discussion of spirituality in America. It’s one of those things, like eating or sleeping, that Americans just get. Can we name any other famous wanderers? I am reminded of Plato, Jesus and the historical Buddha.

The history of the human species is one of hunger, desire, and the movement of people through a vast wilderness. In fact, the American myth fails to make sense until we begin to reconstruct the alleged campaign of some angry Christians who washed ashore in New England, Bibles in hand.

The paradigm then is one of “wandering forth” in an American wilderness. Kerouac becomes the American Buddha.

I suspect, on some level, Kerouac knew this. And in his mind the Himalayas were part of the same emanation that made the Cascade Mountains. For Jack, there really wasn’t a lot of “substantive” difference between the jungles of northern India and the forests of Washington state.

“The closer you get to real matter, rock air fire and wood, boy, the more spiritual the world is. All these people thinking they’re hardheaded materialistic practical types, they don’t know [expletive] about matter, their heads are full of dreamy ideas and notions.”

These are the words of Japhy Ryder (Kerouac’s friend in the dharma: Gary Snyder.) Snyder would go on to become one of the premier voices in a resurgent American naturalism – the movement continues to this day. Snyder’s voice is still pre-eminent in “green” or ecological circles.

Today the green community has incorporated ancient philosophy and reckoned old Japhy-wisdom can save an imperiled planet. As Kerouac and Snyder tramped around the West Coast, however, the end of civilization was not at hand. Global warming wasn’t quite on the radar. In fact, the “dharma bums” thought that a new civilization was emergent; this thought engendered by a Buddhist consciousness.

For Kerouac, Snyder and other “beatniks” of the ’60s, nature became a “sacred wilderness” in which to explore the mysteries of self and consciousness. It had less to do with honoring Mother Earth and more to do with Buddhist meditation in a peaceful environment. Today their experience seems visionary. But one shouldn’t forget that “mystics” have found great wisdom in wild places. Nature, then, is the venue for a direct, experiential kind of reflection.

We should be careful, however, assigning too much to Kerouac and his bums. It is true that he valued the natural environment before it was really hip to do so. He had the gift of catholic insight and poetic awareness. Unfortunately his personal psychology was also shaped by alcohol addiction and madness. In America it has been a tradition to celebrate madness and ignore genius. But madness isn’t “cool.” In fact, it’s just the opposite.

The 1960s were marked by a belief that madness was somehow similar to “truth.” The alchemy predicted spiritual evolution and God-consciousness. America spoke the vernacular of “revolution” and the public caught fire with an unbounded enthusiasm. The Age of Aquarius was also the Age of Buddha. In hindsight we know that Jack Kerouac probably tasted satori, or the “enlightened mind.” But his vision was compromised.