the WILLIAM SEWARD BURROUGHS thread

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version

Well-known member
version said:

William Burroughs’ 10 Favorite Novels​

The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Process, Brion Gysin
The Satyricon, Petronius
In Youth Is Pleasure, Denton Welsh
Two Serious Ladies, Jane Bowles
The Sheltering Sky, Paul Bowles
Under Western Eyes, Joseph Conrad
Journey to the End of the Night, Louis-Ferdinand Céline
Querelle of Brest, Jean Genet
The Unfortunate Traveller and Other Works, Thomas Nashe
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It's funny Paul Bowles coming up as I'd just stuck The Sheltering Sky on my list without knowing Burroughs was into him. Something similar happened in reverse yesterday with a book he rated called You Can't Win that then came up in something totally unrelated I was watching. I suppose it's a sign, like when I checked the temperature earlier and it said it was 23 degrees.
 
V

version

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"The Industrial Revolution is primarily a virus revolution, dedicated to controlled proliferation of identical objects and persons."
 
V

version

Well-known member
poetix said:
It took me a long time to get it through my head that WSB was quite a terrible person. Misogynist, pederast sex tourist, wife killer, conspiracy-theorising crank, someone who evaded responsibility all his life long due to family money and connections. He had a magnetic quality all the same. I treasured all the writings, including the collected letters, the dream diary, the essays ("Women: A Biological Mistake?"). He seemed like someone who had made a breakthrough of some kind; and actually, in terms of what literature is capable of, I really think he did.
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I recently read a Mike Davis interview where he mentioned this sort of thing regarding Raymond Chandler. What he said wasn't necessarily that interesting, but what I did find interesting was it was Mike Davis saying it as I had this impression of him as very dogmatic and unwavering in his political convictions.

"I hate Raymond Chandler, yet I’ve read him and reread him so many times. He’s a fascist, and I mean this in a precise sense. He represents the small businessman being trampled by outside forces. Each of his novels has an openly racist section. But of course, you care about the writing, and you end up forgiving things that really aren’t forgivable."
 
V

version

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Reading The Yage Letters: Redux now. So far it's Burroughs the bumbling white man getting sick, getting hustled and saying obnoxious things about South Americans.
 
luka

luka

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im completely sanguine about the best artists being terrible people cos everyone is terrible. it doesnt trouble me in the slightest. if you heard how me and edmund talk at work you would report us to the police. it's utterly reprehensible. if you saw what version says in the private group chat you would put him on a special list. everyone is awful.
 
luka

luka

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admittedly i havent nonced little kids like michael jackson or kept teenage sex slaves like r kelly but its all a question of degree.
 
V

version

Well-known member
I can put up with artists being terrible people. What I'm saying is the book's been dull and flimsy and, so far, consists of him complaining about the state of hotels, throwing up from drugs and describing local people as toothless or looking like monkeys. There's been nothing to recommend it so all there is to focus on is the negatives.
 
luka

luka

Well-known member
he could be fighting against the status quo but instead he reinforces it. i much prefer hitler. at least he had a vision
 
Mr. Tea

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
version said:
What I'm saying is the book's been dull and flimsy and, so far, consists of him complaining about the state of hotels, throwing up from drugs and describing local people as toothless or looking like monkeys.
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And you can get that for free from most of the regulars here on any given day of the week.
 
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