說憂傷，其實這不是一部容易讓人落淚的書，它平平淡淡的開卷，平平淡淡在路中攤開所及的環境，平平淡淡的勾勒人物麵貌，平平淡淡講述每個人的故事，即使是縱酒狂歡，也好像被mute了一般，人物的麵貌和性格在爆發的快樂中有一種沉默的力量。在平淡裏，在沉默中，落魄艱苦的旅行和迷茫的人生之路疊映起來，讓人常常咀嚼出一種苦澀的味道。
書從第一個part開始，一卷比一卷好，筆鋒簡潔又不失細膩，人物事件平易真實，最喜歡第四卷在墨西哥的旅程描述，有些探險的曆程讓人想起魯賓遜漂流記的中片斷，但文筆更勝一籌。
I went back to my bed of steel and stretched out with my arms spread. I didn't even know if branches or open sky were directly above me, and it made no difference. I opened my mouth to it and drew deep breaths of jungle atmosphere. It was not air, never air, but the palpable and living emanation of trees and swamp. I stayed awake. Roosters began to crow the dawn across the brakes somewhere. Still no air, no breeze, no dew, but the same Tropic of Cancer heaviness held us all pinned to earth, where we belonged and tingled.
還有書中一些思考的文字，智慧，但不囂張
We came into the dizzying heights of the Sierra Madre Oriental. The banana trees gleamed golden in the haze. Great fogs yawned beyond stone walls along the precipice. Below, the Moctezuma was a thin golden thread in a green jungle mat. Strange crossroad towns on top of the world rolled by, with shawled Indians watching us from under hatbrims and rebozos. Life was dense, dark, ancient. They watched Dean, serious and insane at his raving wheel, with eyes of hawks. All had their hands outstretched. They had come down from the back mountains and higher places to hold forth their hands for something they thought civilization could offer, and they never dreamed the sadness and the poor broken delusion of it. They didn't know that a bomb had come that could crack all our bridges and roads and reduce them to jumbles, and we would be as poor as they someday, and stretching out our hands in the same, same way. Our broken Ford, old thirties upgoing America Ford, rattled through them and vanished in dust.
