Exsanguination

During the final stages of WWII, the French Vichy regime was on the run, following the retreating Nazi establishment further and further into Europe. Eventually they took up residence in Sigmaringen Castle, where Petain and Laval rattled around with other fugitive fascists, chief among them the writer Celine.

Celine wrote a book about this experience, Castle to Castle, which the writer Jack Kerouac chose to discuss over dinner at Steve Allen's house.

Steve Allen.

Jack Kerouac.

Jayne Meadows.

Sitting around, discussing an obscure work of Celine.

How did that conversation go?

All we know is that Kerouac described Castle to Castle as "a portrait of existence as rotten and mad.” At what point in the conversation did he make this observation? Who noted it and reported it in such a precise way that it could be quoted later in the book Subterranean Kerouac?

The Wikipedia article lists the fact of this curious dinner conversation on its Castle to Castle page. The anecdote takes up half of the article, perhaps even a little more, and is certainly more informative than the brief, vague description of the book's topic.

But that is all wikipedia has to say about the book.

A description of the book by a later American author at a comedian/television host's house.

Kerouac with Allen on the latter's TV show

Why Kerouac? Surely others have things to say about this book. Why is it important where he was when he said it?

In other words, who is the careful scholar who sat down to edit the Castle to Castle stub and decided that this anecdote (is it even an anecdote?) was all that was needed?

It is carefully documented. The publisher of Subterranean Kerouac is provided, as well as the year, and the page number (301).

What was the scholar's intention? How did he come by the article? What is more important to him: that Kerouac had something to say about Celine, or that Kerouac said something striking about Celine, or that Kerouac ate dinner with Steve Allen and Jayne Meadows?

Surely the author of the article, such as it is, is a fan of one of these people.

Celine died of an aneurysm in 1961. Kerouac bled to death from drinking too much in 1969. Steve Allen died in 2000 from a burst blood vessel in his heart caused by a minor car accident.

Jayne Meadows lives. If someday she bleeds to death the whole thing will begin to make sense.