“… a world full of rucksack wanderers, dharma bums refusing to 

subscribe to the general demand that they consume production and 

there have to work for the privilege of consuming, all that crap 

they didn't really want anyway such as refrigerators, tv sets, cars, 

at least new fancy cars, certain hair oils and deodorants and 

general junk you finally always see a week later in the garbage 

anyway, all of them imprisoned in a system of work, produce, 

consume, work, produce, consume, i see a vision of a great 

rucksack revolution thousands or even millions of young americans 

wandering around with rucksacks, going up into the mountains to 

pray, making children laugh and old men glad, making young girls 

happy and old girls happier, all of 'em zen lunatics who go about 

writing poems that happen to appear in their heads for no reason 

and also by being kind and also by strange unexpected acts keep 

giving visions of eternal freedom to everybody and to all living 

creatures” 

“The silence is so intense that you can hear your own blood 

roar in your ears but louder than that by far is the 

mysterious roar which I always identify with the roaring of 

the diamond wisdom, the mysterious roar of silence itself, 

which is a great Shhhh reminding you of something you've 

seemed to have forgotten in the stress of your days since 

birth.” 

(Jack Kerouac, The Dharma Bums)