I'd heard about it from a friend in the mid-80s, this friend was an aspiring writer and he mentioned OTR but then was musing about his new word processor typewriter, saying that he felt like the need to physically change pages added breaks to his writing process and he was worried that with the basically infinite page on the word processor it would be too easy to write crap. I wish I had a way to look this guy up and get his take on writing today.
I noticed the lack of glue and yellowed tape. Actually it consists of strips of paper that are 12 foot long, taped together.
and: However, the return of the scroll to the auction block echoes an earlier controversy. In 2001, when the manuscript was last offered for sale, Carolyn Cassady – the former wife of Neal Cassady, the real-life inspiration for the novel’s Dean Moriarty – denounced the auction as “blasphemy”, arguing that the scroll belonged in a public library rather than a private collection. “Jack loved public libraries,” she said at the time, adding: “If they auction it, anybody rich could buy it and keep it out of sight.”
Yes, this is the iconic version, but the whole point of Kerouac is that its "jazz" and improvised, despite the published novel being at least 6 drafts different
Not to mention the french version, and the previous attempts at the novel.