This was what tipped me into ordering the first letters volume rather than the second. Apparently the first is him talking about drugs and traveling and he's precise and witty whereas a lot of the second is him talking about Scientology and the cut ups and complaining about money and publishers.
the WILLIAM SEWARD BURROUGHS thread
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This was what tipped me into ordering the first letters volume rather than the second. Apparently the first is him talking about drugs and traveling and he's precise and witty whereas a lot of the second is him talking about Scientology and the cut ups and complaining about money and publishers.
william_kent
Well-known member
I can't read Burroughs without hearing his voice resonate through my skull
maybe the only author where I truly experience and hear the "authorial voice"
woops
is not like other people
william_kent
Well-known member
COMBAT COMMANDER TO BASE!
ACTION PACKED WAR COMIC!
Mark Stewart & The Maffia - The Wrong Name And The Wrong Number
PAY IT ALL
PAY IT ALL
PAY IT ALL
PAY IT ALL BACK
ACTION PACKED WAR COMIC!
Mark Stewart & The Maffia - The Wrong Name And The Wrong Number
PAY IT ALL
PAY IT ALL
PAY IT ALL
PAY IT ALL BACK
We've talked about the rumour he was CIA before, but I didn't know he was actually contacted by the OSS out of college.
The Invisible Man, by Lucy Sante
The Invisible Man, by Lucy Sante
It's great what reading him does to your perception and awareness of certain things. I got a leaflet through the door the other day about Royal Mail's non-barcoded stamps expiring and it had the phrase TIME IS RUNNING OUT TO USE UP YOUR OLD NON-BARCODED STAMPS on it, but "non-barcoded stamps" was in yellow, so at a glance you'd just see TIME IS RUNNING OUT TO USE UP YOUR OLD.
I probably wouldn't have given it a second look if I hadn't been on the Burroughs frequency atm, but I did a double take and it really popped out at me.
I probably wouldn't have given it a second look if I hadn't been on the Burroughs frequency atm, but I did a double take and it really popped out at me.
william_kent
Well-known member
Burroughs: We are squandering time and time is running out. We must conceive of time as a resource.
Burroughs on the Mayans ( excerpt from the full interview I post below ):
WSB - Abandoned Artifacts
WSB - On The Nova Lark
Burroughs has erected a body of work that is oddly self-contained and self-referential. What makes this odd is that he so prizes the effect of breaking up the linear structure of his writing by chance devices and other interference from the outside. Since Naked Lunch, his writing has been invaded by overheard conversations, newspaper headlines, and similar kinds of texts that settle like airborne microbes. This kind of deliberate disruption goes back at least to Tristan Tzara; what is peculiar to Burroughs is the way that randomly chosen or observed details survive and mutate through book after book. The new novel, for example, begins on September 17, 1899, an innocuous-sounding date. However, it can be traced back to “Afternoon Ticker Tape,” a work he composed for Jeff Nuttall’s My Own Mag in 1964, in which he rearranged phrases from The New York Times of September 17, 1899.
Burroughs’s work abounds in such echoes. A Chinese shopkeeper observed by him in South America in 1953, and described in The Yage Letters, makes cameo appearances in at least five books, the context changing every time, but in every one he is sucking on his original toothpick. As isolated events in the books, such briefly glimpsed incidents and details are merely part of the texture, but their recurrence makes them unsettling, causing the reader momentary subliminal hesitation. They deliberately stir the familiar with the uncanny, and plant red herrings for anyone seeking a pattern.
The Invisible Man, by Lucy Sante
william_kent
Well-known member
"The Bomb didn't go off in the end. But Jeff had a blast."
Trocchi being mentioned there along with Burroughs reminds me I stumbled across this intriguing sounding book recently.
"A poignant memoir of the Paris literary scene in the 1950s and 1960s by one of its protagonists. Some of last century's leading cultural figures are brought to life here, people who shaped our modern thinking and defined the tastes of an entire generation, changing forever the way we look at literature and the world around us. Drawing from the accounts of two fellow publishers—Maurice Girodias and Barney Rosset, who were also active in the heady days of 1950s and 1960s Paris, London, and New York—and from his own personal recollections, John Calder talks about the challenges of being a publisher in that era of censorship and political persecution and the problems faced by such writers as Beckett, Burroughs, Trocchi, and Miller to have their work accepted and recognized. Told in John Calder's trademark raconteur style and peppered with salacious, revealing, and entertaining anecdotes, this book will appeal both to the general reader and anyone who is interested in the social and cultural history of the 20th century."
william_kent
Well-known member
Trocchi being mentioned there along with Burroughs reminds me I stumbled across this intriguing sounding book recently.
"A poignant memoir of the Paris literary scene in the 1950s and 1960s by one of its protagonists. Some of last century's leading cultural figures are brought to life here, people who shaped our modern thinking and defined the tastes of an entire generation, changing forever the way we look at literature and the world around us. Drawing from the accounts of two fellow publishers—Maurice Girodias and Barney Rosset, who were also active in the heady days of 1950s and 1960s Paris, London, and New York—and from his own personal recollections, John Calder talks about the challenges of being a publisher in that era of censorship and political persecution and the problems faced by such writers as Beckett, Burroughs, Trocchi, and Miller to have their work accepted and recognized. Told in John Calder's trademark raconteur style and peppered with salacious, revealing, and entertaining anecdotes, this book will appeal both to the general reader and anyone who is interested in the social and cultural history of the 20th century."
when I'm actually sober I may post my considerate and reasoned review of the Trocchi biography, 'Making of a Monster", but in the meantime here's the TLDR; version: "he was an absolute cunt"
edit: although, fun fact. you know that novelty toilet paper where you wipe your arse on some dickhead politician's face? Trocchi invented that - about the only outcome of note from his "project SIGMA"
william_kent
Well-known member
edit: although the "Trocchi is a cunt" biography did cause me to buy a couple of books about Olympia Press and the Parisian sexploitation publishing scene, so it wasn't a complete loss
WashYourHands
Cat Malogen
Thread delivers!
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Same here. A truly great voice.
Benny Bunter
Well-known member
All this activity here got me excited so I've splashed on copies of Nova express and soft machine, better be fucking good.
Perfect beach reading, lol
Perfect beach reading, lol