In a well developed, thoughtful piece of writing that uses direct quotes, explain the relationship between your honors novel and the time period that fostered it's creation.
I read On the Road, by Jack Kerouac. It was written in the 1950s, and it focuses heavily on the "Beat Generation". In On the Road, the main character Sal goes all over America (and Mexico) through various forms of transportation-- the most common being hitchhiking. Sal is a writer, as most of his friends are, and he explores the world and learns a lot about humanity and life in general. Sal is with Dean Moriarty for the majority of the book and together they explore the idea of the anti-conformist movement, the Beat Generation. Experimenting with drugs, sex, and the new jazz movement were some of the focuses of the Beat Generation, and Sal and Dean definitely experimented. If I were to label them under a stereotype they would be beatniks or hipsters; they were opposed to "mainstream society" and did crazy things like stealing cars, smoking a lot of marijuana in Mexico, having sex with prostitutes, etc. Jack Kerouac's On the Road was probably the book that best defined the 50's. Sal and Dean's ridiculous adventures showed us the beat movement of the 50's through an insane road trip.
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