Naked Lunch
by William S. Burroughs
List Price:
Our Price: $10.94
You Save: $13.06 (54%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $8.95 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: William S. BurroughsIntroduction: David Ulin
Edition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2009-11-01
ISBN: 0802119263
Number of pages: 320
Publisher: Grove Press
Book Reviews of Naked Lunch
Book Review: incredible language
Summary: 5 Stars
"I can feel the heat closing in, feel them out there making their moves, setting up their devil doll stool pigeons, crooning over my spoon and dropper I throw away at Washington Square Station, vault a turnstile and two flights down the iron stairs, catch an uptown A train . . ."
How could one not love a "novel" with such an opening page? We're given a three-word chapter heading signifying the genesis of the protagonist's journey west (note direction) then jump straight into his mind as he hurries his way onto a New York subway, paranoid that he's being tailed by a narcotics agent - all of this told with Burroughs' feverish style that meanders constantly between poetry and prose.
OK, admittedly this isn't a book for everyone. Readers who find coherence of plot to be paramount need look elsewhere. In fact Burroughs himself said the book was meant to be read out of order, at random. After all, it was born from a mad collection of papers scribbled onto by Burroughs during a long bout of habitual heroin use (to name one of the substances he indulged in). The book's protagonist follows a vaguely biographical journey paralleling Burroughs' own during this time period, except rather than told from the detached and reflective viewpoint of one who has escaped his addiction, we're given the raw emotion and perspective of Burroughs as he saw the world while drugged out and imaginative, and if nothing else it's entirely original.
I feel the perspective the piece offers along with the poetically insane language are enough to merit reading this book. But there is indeed something of a vague plot line to follow (a plotline perhaps drawn in chalk during a rainstorm . . .) as well as Burroughs' deeper sentiments - sometimes manifesting in allegorical anecdotes, usually sexual in nature - concerning politics, society, art, etc. Just don't expect these things to jump out of the page at you. Do expect the description to, though.ure - concerning politics, society, art, etc. Just don't expect these things to jump out of the page at you. Do expect the description to, though.
Jake Wilson - author of Chasing Rabbits
Summary of Naked Lunch
Naked Lunch is one of the most important novels of the twentieth century, a book that redefined not just literature but American culture. An unnerving tale of a narcotics addict unmoored in New York, Tangiers, and ultimately a nightmarish wasteland known as interzone, its formal innovation, formerly taboo subject matter, and tour de force execution have exerted their influence on the work of authors like Thomas Pynchon, J. G. Ballard, and William Gibson; on the relationship of art and obscenity; and on the shape of music, film and media generally. Naked Lunch: The Restored Text includes many editorial corrections on the text, several essays he wrote over the years about the book, and an appendix of 20 percent new material and alternate drafts from the original manuscript, which predates the first published version. For the Burroughs enthusiast and the neophyte, this volume is a valuable and fresh experience of this classic of our culture.
"He was," as Salon's Gary Kamyia notes, "20th-century drug culture's Poe, its Artaud, its Baudelaire. He was the prophet of the literature of pure experience, a phenomenologist of dread.... Burroughs had the scary genius to turn the junk wasteland into a parallel universe, one as thoroughly and obsessively rendered as Blake's."
Why has this homosexual ex-junkie, whose claim to fame rests entirely on one book--the hallucinogenic ravings of a heroin addict--so seized the collective imagination? Burroughs wrote Naked Lunch in a Tangier, Morocco, hotel room between 1954 and 1957. Allen Ginsberg and his beatnik cronies burst onto the scene, rescued the manuscript from the food-encrusted floor, and introduced some order to the pages. It was published in Paris in 1959 by the notorious Olympia Press and in the U.S. in 1962; the landmark obscenity trial that ensued served to end literary censorship in America.
Burroughs's literary experiment--the much-touted "cut-up" technique--mirrored the workings of a junkie's brain. But it was junk coupled with vision: Burroughs makes teeming amalgam of allegory, sci-fi, and non-linear narration, all wrapped in a blend of humor--slapstick, Swiftian, slang-infested humor. What is Naked Lunch about? People turn into blobs amidst the sort of evil that R. Crumb, in the decades to come, would inimitably flesh out with his dark and creepy cartoon images. Perhaps the most easily grasped part of Naked Lunch is its America-bashing, replete with slang and vitriol. Read it and see for yourself.
Humor Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in Humor Books
Snuffby Chuck Palahniuk
Anchor; Published: 2009-04-07; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.95
Price in other shops:
Don't Eat This Bookby Morgan Spurlock
Penguin Audio; Published: 2005-05-19; Audio CD; Book
Best price: $4.61
Price in other shops:
I Hope They Serve Beer in Hellby Tucker Max
Penguin; Published: 2006; Paperback; Book
The Saber-Tooth Curriculumby J.Abner Peddiwell
Mcgraw-Hill; Published: 1959-06-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $10.00
Miss Americaby Howard Stern
It Books; Published: 2010-08-24; Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.71
Price in other shops:
101 Places Not to See Before You Dieby Catherine Price
Harper Perennial; Published: 2010-06-22; Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.49
Price in other shops:
My Life and Hard Times (Perennial Classics)by James Thurber
Harper Perennial Modern Classics; Published: 1999-10-06; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.78
Price in other shops:
Equal Rites: A Discworld Novel (Discworld Novels)by Terry Pratchett
Harper Perennial; Published: 2005-09-13; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.23
Price in other shops:
Mirth of a Nation: Audio Companion, Fellow Traveler and Friend for Life--Laff Tracks From America's Most Trusted Humor Anthologyby Michael J. Rosen
HarperAudio; Published: 2002-11-12; Audio CD; Book
Best price: $4.51
Price in other shops:
Red, White & Liberalby Alan Colmes
HarperAudio; Published: 2003-10-28; Audio Cassette; Book
Best price: $0.01
Price in other shops:
Similar Books and other products
On the Road (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)by Jack Kerouac
Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 1999-06-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.31
Price in other shops:
The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell (P.S.)by Aldous Huxley
Harper Perennial Modern Classics; Published: 2009-07-28; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.31
Price in other shops:
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dreamby Hunter S. Thompson
Vintage; Published: 1998-05-12; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.31
Price in other shops:
The Dharma Bums (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)by Jack Kerouac
Penguin Classics; Published: 2006-10-31; Paperback; Book
Best price: $9.07
Price in other shops:
Queer: A Novelby William S. Burroughs
Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 1987-01-06; Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.65
Price in other shops:
Howl and Other Poems (City Lights Pocket Poets Series)by Allen Ginsberg
City Lights Publishers; Published: 2001-01-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $9.10
Price in other shops:
On the Road: The Original Scroll (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)by Jack Kerouac
Penguin Classics; Published: 2008-08-26; Paperback; Book
Best price: $9.64
Price in other shops:
Junky: The Definitive Text of "Junk" (50th Anniversary Edition)by William S. Burroughs
Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 2003-04-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.50
Price in other shops:
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Testby Tom Wolfe
Picador; Published: 2008-08-19; Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.99
Price in other shops:
Howl and Other Poems (City Lights Pocket Poets, No. 4)by Allen Ginsberg
City Lights Publishers; Published: 2001-01-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.90
Price in other shops: