Posted on 02/13/2014 9:41:05 AM PST by Borges
William S. Burroughs was a counterculture icon: In more than two dozen books, including the landmark novel Naked Lunch, he laid down an original vision that influenced everyone from political activists to punk rockers, filmmakers to sci-fi writers.
In 1962, writer Norman Mailer described him as "the only American novelist living today who may conceivably be possessed by genius."
Burroughs was born 100 years ago Wednesday.
(Excerpt) Read more at npr.org ...
He was queer as a 3 dollar bill.
Burroughs hated Roosevelt and the New Deal, hated bureaucracy, loved guns (killed his wife by shooting her in the head) was quite libertarian.
Also believed in all sorts of psychic pseudo-science pseudo-religious mumbo jumbo.
He could turn a phrase, had a Missouri drawl and obsessed too much and described vile practices in his writing.
He was a lot of things.
Queer, often, and often not.
A murderer, a hopeless addict, and most likely insane.
There was a lot of talent in a thoroughly disastrous package.
He was not only “queer” (actually, he slept with anything), but evil. He wasn’t a genius at all and only became popular with the leftist academy because he was so “transgressive” - that is, evil. He had been married and had at least one child, but he finally moved to the ME because pederasty and numerous other corrupt things were legal there. And his writings, mainly a chronicle of depravity, are garbage.
His son, btw, died homeless in a ditch in Florida at the age of 33. The one time the son had gone to visit his father, when he was about 13, his father’s French boy friend (for that 15 minutes) had tried to get him into bed with him.
Evil. And I suspect his lousy writings led other people into evil. So of course, he is deserving of a “centennial tribute.”
It’s his influence that can’t be avoided. On the Beats and later writers.
I tried to read “Naked Lunch.” Couldn’t do it. I’ll give him credit...he could write a great, if somewhat obscene, sentence. But he couldn’t put sentences together to make a....well...a story...a novel...anything.
Once you got past the shock factor that comes with all the obscenity and homosexuality...there just wasn’t much there.
Here’s a Burrough’s quote:
After a shooting spree, they always want to take the guns away from the people who didn’t do it. I sure as hell wouldn’t want to live in a society where the only people allowed guns are the police and the military.
Grand Street, no. 37 & The War Universe (1992)
Ever see the Cronenberg film? It’s not really an adaptation as much as a meditation on the novel and Burroughs. It’s a masterly film but hard to watch.
Yes...I liked the movie...at least, I liked it as a “cult film,” meaning that I’m not overly demanding....but the movie was downright coherent compared to the book.
Since Mailer is mentioned...what ever happened to the promised follow-up to Harlot’s Ghost? I was waiting for that and then the bastard just up and died.
Our usual disagreements aside
I watched Counselor last night
WTH...
Was Ridley high?
Poor Penelope....that was just wrong...my little tulip
But Cameron Diaz on the windshield..... lord have mercy
My wife turned to me and declared instantly “don’t you even dare ask...with our old 911 ragger”
I’m like Alfred Neuman....” who me?”...id never ever dare ask such a depraved request....lol.....shucks
Burroughs... his scenes going through the stash with Dillon in Drugstore Cowboy till he finds the Dilaudid....is perfect for a cameo
Ridley Scott’s films do nothing for me. Blade Runner was a rare case where his obsession with surface gloss enhanced the themes. The rest? Meh.
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