The Dharma Bums is a 1958 novel by
Beat Generation author
Jack Kerouac. The semi-fictional accounts in the novel are based upon events that occurred years after the events of
On the Road. The main characters are the narrator Ray Smith, based on Kerouac, and Japhy Ryder, based on the poet and essayist
Gary Snyder, who was instrumental in Kerouac's introduction to
Buddhism in the mid-1950s. The book largely concerns duality in Kerouac's life and ideals, examining the relationship that the outdoors, mountaineering, hiking and hitchhiking through the West had with his "city life" of jazz clubs, poetry readings, and drunken parties. The protagonist's search for a "Buddhist" context to his experiences (and those of others he encounters) is a recurring theme throughout the story.