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Mountains
For Ray Smith, alcohol represents the emptiness and vice of human civilization, which he contrasts with the apparent purity and virtue of the life he creates when he goes off to live alone in the wilderness. Although Ray drinks frequently and compulsively throughout the book, his times of greatest enlightenment are generally his soberest. For instance, when Ray goes to hike Mount Matterhorn with Japhy and Henry, he initially worries that he won’t have access to alcohol—but then, after taking in the fresh mountain air and meditating on the natural world that surrounds him, Ray realizes that he no longer feels any compulsion to drink. His indifference to alcohol suggests that nature has a purifying effect on him.
While alcohol doesn’t always detract from Ray’s search for enlightenment, it’s only necessary when he’s surrounded by other people (rather than alone in nature). Namely, when Ray parties with his closest friends—Japhy, Alvah Goldbrook, and Warren Coughlin—they get drunk, write poetry, and talk about Buddhism together. Alcohol helps them heighten their senses and unleash their creativity so that they can better understand the universe. Similarly, Ray sometimes gets drunk at parties so that he can go meditate in a corner—when he’s surrounded by people, he needs to heighten his senses through alcohol in order to focus on the truths of nature and the universe. But when he’s out in the wilderness, he can do this sober. These examples suggest that alcohol is Ray’s response to the evil or impurity of human civilization. That said, it’s also a vice in itself—arguably, Ray’s compulsive drinking is his fatal flaw as a character, as it signifies that he’s never fully able to abandon human vices and reach the spiritual enlightenment he seeks.
Alcohol Quotes in The Dharma Bums
The The Dharma Bums quotes below all refer to the symbol of Alcohol. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 13
Quotes
“Yessir, that's what, a series of monasteries for fellows to go and monastate and meditate in, we can have groups of shacks up in the Sierras or the High Cascades or even Ray says down in Mexico and have big wild gangs of pure holy men getting together to drink and talk and pray, think of the waves of salvation can flow out of nights like that, and finally have women, too, wives, small huts with religious families, like the old days of the Puritans. Who's to say the cops of America and the Republicans and Democrats are gonna tell everybody what to do?”
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Chapter 25
Quotes
“It goes on and on, the disciples and the Masters go through the same thing, first they have to find and tame the ox of their mind essence, and then abandon that, then finally they attain to nothing, as represented by this empty panel, then having attained nothing they attain everything which is springtime blossoms in the trees so they end up coming down to the city to get drunk with the butchers like Li Po.” That was a very wise cartoon, it reminded me of my own experience, trying to tame my mind in the woods, then realizing it was all empty and awake and I didn't have to do anything, and now I was getting drunk with the butcher Japhy. We played records and lounged around smoking then went out and cut more wood.
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Alcohol Symbol Timeline in The Dharma Bums
The timeline below shows where the symbol Alcohol appears in The Dharma Bums. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 1
...September 1955, Ray Smith, the novel’s narrator, rides a train from Los Angeles to Santa Barbara, although his final destination is San Francisco. Another bum climbs on the train with him....
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In Santa Barbara, Ray goes to the beach and cooks on an open flame. Then he swims, dances...
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Chapter 2
...guitar. Presently, Ray gives a beautiful woman drugs in exchange for a ride from Santa Barbara to San Francisco, where he meets the gregarious Japhy. They get beers, and that evening...
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...lively celebration of fresh San Francisco talent. Ray collects change for the poets and serves wine. A poet named Alvah Goldbrook drunkenly and passionately recites one of his poems, inspiring the...
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Chapter 4
The next evening, Warren Coughlin, Alvah Goldbrook, and Ray visit Japhy with a gallon of wine. On their way to Japhy’s shack, Warren fondly remembers partying with Japhy in college, and...
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Chapter 5
Ray goes to dim the light and fetch wine, and when he comes back, Princess, Japhy, and Alvah are naked. Japhy says it’s time...
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Chapter 6
...promises that it’ll be enough once the food is rehydrated, and there’s no need to drink alcohol at high altitudes.
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The guys drive up into the mountains and get a drink at a bar full of hunters who obsessively ask if they’ve seen any deer. In...
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After Ray and Japhy have two drinks, the guys get back in Henry’s car. They have no chance of reaching the trailhead...
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Chapter 8
...that this hike is a much better way to spend a Saturday morning than getting drunk in San Francisco—but Japhy quips that it’s wrong to compare experiences because all of life...
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Chapter 10
...endless stars and Ray realizes that, with the altitude and exercise, he doesn’t crave a drink at all. Afterward, Japhy washes the dishes and pulls out a star map, which shows...
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Chapter 12
...himself an anti-materialistic bhikku, he eats voraciously. After dinner, the guys buy a bottle of wine and smoke a cigar to celebrate. Henry drives all night to get them back home...
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Chapter 13
...Japhy and Warren Coughlin show up to party with Ray and Alvah. They get wildly drunk and start wandering around town, carrying some enormous flowers and yelling out verses of poetry...
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...“blueberry spies,” how “the rhododendron tree is only half enlightened,” and so on. As they drink more and more, they’re increasingly impressed by their own creativity. Eventually, Ray and Warren nearly...
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Chapter 15
...just a dream,” but she insists that the police conspiracy is real. Ray gets some wine and brings some friends back to party in Cody and Rosie’s apartment, but Rosie tells...
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Chapter 18
...Ray lies that he used to live there. They cross back over the border, get drunk in a bar, and visit a brothel. The next day, they make it all the...
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Chapter 22
...day, Ray hitchhikes up past Atlanta, but then he catches a ride with a reckless drunk driver and decides it’s safer to stick to buses and trains. He then catches a...
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...border to Ciudad Juárez. After visiting a church and market, he finds himself at a bar, yelling at some local men in Spanish about the vacuity of the desert and the...
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Chapter 25
...a boy taming and abandoning an ox, then finding enlightenment in the wilderness and getting drunk in the city. This is a metaphor for Buddhism, and Ray realizes that it describes...
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...that Sean is superstitious and kindhearted, and Whitey is young and naïve. Soon, the three drunken couples start dancing naked. Japhy and Sean briefly force Patsy into the bedroom, which they...
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...Japhy is also seeing another beautiful girl named Psyche, but he always pressures her to drink, because otherwise she won’t have sex with him. One weekend, she accompanies Ray and Japhy...
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Chapter 26
Whenever Ray is inebriated at parties, he closes his eyes and has holy visions. His friends celebrate them, but...
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Chapter 27
Ray and Japhy get into a fight in San Francisco: Ray wants to get drunk in an alleyway, but Japhy thinks that Ray drinks too much. Japhy would rather go...
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Chapter 28
On the evening of Japhy’s big party, Ray dreads socializing until someone brings him wine. Sean sets up a huge bonfire, and the guests divide into three groups, like during...
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Chapter 29
...turn down the treacherously steep two-mile trail toward Stinson Beach. When they arrive, they buy wine from a grocery store and drink it on the beach. They swim and have lunch—salami...
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Chapter 30
...forest. The trail is uncomfortably steep; Ray feels miserable and desperately wants a Hershey chocolate bar. When they make it back to the shack, Ray’s feet hurt so badly that he...
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Chapter 31
A drunk housepainter brings Ray to Portland, where he catches a bus into Washington, then a ride...
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Chapter 32
Ray has a drink in a rundown tavern and hitchhikes up to the Marblemount Ranger Station. When he arrives,...
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...go to Desolation Peak,—but it's rainy, and Happy says that he hopes Ray brought some brandy to cope with the weather. In fact, it’s still snowing on Desolation Peak, and Ray...
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