Jack Kerouac wrote the BELIEF & TECHNIQUE FOR MODERN PROSE, a 30-rule blueprint for writing that is more than a check list on how to approach writing — it’s a meditation and philosophy for an artist or creative. Rumor has it that these rules were nailed to the wall in Allen Ginsberg’s hotel room in San Francisco by Jack, and were partly his daily inspiration while writing Howl.
The Beat’s were involved in many parts of the creative world, including photography. Robert Frank’s prolific photo book, The Americans, even had Kerouac writing its introduction. The story goes that he and Frank met at a party and he showed Kerouac the photographs outside on the sidewalk. Kerouac was moved and wrote the introduction for Frank. I could only imagine what Jack thought when he saw those images, they must’ve been like the moments he saw on the road frozen in time.
The Americans is one of my favorite photography books, and Kerouac is one of my favorite writers, so naturally I have long thought about his rules for modern prose. I even read them this morning for inspiration to tackle my various photo and writing projects.
But something was different this morning, it made me want to go out and shoot, so I thought I would try to translate his 30 rules into a photographic perspective before I conquered my day. Hopefully they will help inspire you too.

By Tom Palumbo from New York, NY, USA (Jack Kerouac) [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons
1. Scribbled secret notebooks, and wild typewritten pages, for yr own joy
Take multiple frames, spare nothing, look at them for your own joy
2. Submissive to everything, open, listening
Don’t just press down the shutter because you can — sit, think, dwell, observe, feel the moment and find your photograph
3. Try never get drunk outside yr own house
Control your behavior around others, the more comfortable subjects feel with you, the more they will give you in front of the lens
4. Be in love with yr life
Wake up everyday and find happiness in that you’re making a living with photography, or if you aren’t, continue to let photography bring you joy and happiness
5. Something that you feel will find its own form
Sometimes you don’t know what you’ve captured, instead, let it evoke emotion and feeling to your audience
6. Be crazy dumbsaint of the mind
Trust your instincts, let go of your mind’s anchors, and believe in yourself and your photography
7. Blow as deep as you want to blow
Take restraint and shove it. Take your creativity to places you’ve always wanted to but were afraid — don’t let anything hold you back
8. Write what you want bottomless from bottom of the mind
Even that idea you think you had that was stupid, well it isn’t stupid at all — just create, create, create
9. The unspeakable visions of the individual
That feeling you get when you know you captured something amazing and you can’t describe the feeling, live for those kind of photographic experiences
10. No time for poetry but exactly what is
Live in the present moment and leave the wax poetic for later
11. Visionary tics shivering in the chest
Those goosebumps you get when you capture the precise moment, try to recreate them as much as possible
12. In tranced fixation dreaming upon object before you
Meditate on your subject and frame to see the potential in your mind before capturing the decisive moment
13. Remove literary, grammatical and syntactical inhibition
Break the rules of photography now and again and leave your inhibition behind, because sometimes it might pay off
14. Like Proust be an old teahead of time
Dwell on life before bed, while you’re awake — try to understand everything you can and learn something new everyday, but don’t kill yourself, and you too can be a bed philosopher like Proust 🙂
15. Telling the true story of the world in interior monolog
Your photos show your world, your experience, let them speak for themselves
16. The jewel center of interest is the eye within the eye
Try to see past things to find a deeper meaning to everything
17. Write in recollection and amazement for yourself
Shoot something, anything that feeds your passion and soul
18. Work from pithy middle eye out, swimming in language sea
Create a narrative to your photographic works by internalizing every image until you find the story you must tell
19. Accept loss forever
Things are impermanent and you can’t change or stop the world from revolving — by accepting life you are unbound and able to take creative risk in your photography
20. Believe in the holy contour of life
Life is beautiful, mysterious, painful, mournful, disappointing, heart wrenching, blissful, hopeful, scary, and every adjective you can conceive of. Life is never static and everything changes, believe that those changes are just part of the beautiful dance of life — and dance along with it
21. Struggle to sketch the flow that already exists intact in mind
Dig deeper for the things you can’t verbalize or create yet, but focus and they will become apparent in time
22. Dont think of words when you stop but to see picture better
Take the photograph, smell the roses, don’t get lost in your thoughts when you should enjoy the amazing moments of life unfolding in front of you
23. Keep track of every day the date emblazoned in yr morning
Remember that ‘a-ha’ moment where you understood what your purpose for being a photographer was — keep it in your mind, never forget it, tattoo it on your arm, bring it back to consciousness when you’re stuck creatively
24. No fear or shame in the dignity of yr experience, language & knowledge
Be proud of your failures because you learned something from them; they made you grow and become a better photographer
25. Write for the world to read and see yr exact pictures of it
Take photographs to show the world your aesthetic, your vision, the beauty you made and captured at your decisive moments
26. Bookmovie is the movie in words, the visual American form
Photography is a collection of real moments frozen in time, make sure they’re languid, that they tell a story like a book or movie, and that your pictures become more than pictures — they are an essay on true life, and maybe those photographs will show people a story they’ve never seen before
27. In praise of Character in the Bleak inhuman Loneliness
Your character is everything, how you react to disappointment, to success and how you treat others — praise, help, and be kind to others all the time, feel compassion and help make the world a better place even when it seems too dark to shed light on
28. Composing wild, undisciplined, pure, coming in from under, crazier the better
Strange angles, slower exposures, filters, post manipulations — the freer your photographs, the freer you will be to create photographs/art without restraint
29. You’re a Genius all the time
Believe that everything you’re creating means something, that anything you do in life is significant, believe in yourself and your decisions, because only you can make yourself successful, you can’t wait for the world to give you anything
30. Writer-Director of Earthly movies Sponsored & Angeled in Heaven
You are the creator and pilot of your photographic aesthetic and destiny, use new tools to create moving images, mix different mediums, and don’t be afraid to experiment when it comes to your works — Be unbound by old boundaries
If you think I got them all wrong, send me an email and let me know what I missed, confused, or you think needs amended :). If you have something better, I’m happy to rewrite. Reach me at adam@precise-moment.com.
I love them all~ both his words and yours.
Thanks Terra! I hope they gave you some inspiration to go out and shoot!