Steely Dan

Naked Lunch is considered Burroughs' seminal work, and one of the landmark publications in the history of American literature. Extremely controversial in both its subject matter and its use of often 'obscene' language (something Burroughs recognized and intended), the book was banned in many regions of the United States, and was one of the last American books to actually be put on trial for obscenity. The book was banned by Boston courts in 1962 due to obscenity (notably child murder in pedophilic acts), but that decision was reversed in a landmark 1966 opinion by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. This was the last major literary censorship battle in the U.S. The Appeals Court found the book did not violate obscenity statutes; the hearing included testimony in support of the work by Allen Ginsberg and Norman Mailer.

In 1959 sections of the manuscript were published in a University of Chicago student run publication The Big Table. The edition was not well received, and caused the university administration to fire the student editors. When the editor Paul Carroll published BIG TABLE Magazine (Issue No. 1, Spring 1959) on his own accord, he was found guilty of sending obscene material through the U.S. mail for including "Ten Episodes from 'Naked Lunch'", a piece of writing the Judicial Officer for the United States Postal Service deemed "undisciplined prose, far more akin to the early work of experimental adolescents than to anything of literary merit" and initially judged it as nonmailable under the provisions of Section 1461, Title 18, United States Code. (The Big Table court decision)

Upon publication, Grove Press added to the book supplementary material regarding the censorship battle as well as an article written by Burroughs on the topic of drug addiction. In 2002, a "restored text" edition of Naked Lunch was published, with some new and previously suppressed material added.

[edit] Plot summary

Naked Lunch consists of many loosely related vignettes in which several characters such as the sadistic, sociopathic and borderline incompetent Dr. Benway reappear. The primary character (one might say the main character) is agent Bill Lee (a pseudonym for Burroughs — Lee was his mother's maiden name; Burroughs also appears in Kerouac's On the Road as "Old Bull Lee" and used the pseudonym William Lee for his first novel, Junkie, and for his second novel, Queer).

The book's structure anticipates the cut-up technique Burroughs would later employ in novels such as the so-called "Nova Trilogy" (The Soft Machine, The Ticket That Exploded, and Nova Express). The stories draw from his experiences in Tangiers and his life in America and Mexico, as well as a tour through South America he undertook after accidentally shooting his common-law wife Joan Vollmer in the head while supposedly playing a drunken game of William Tell. Throughout this period he became addicted to several drugs (notably heroin and morphine). The novel's mix of taboo fantasies, peculiar creatures (like the predatory Mugwumps), and eccentric personalities all serve to unmask mechanisms and processes of control. Burroughs explains the title as “a frozen moment when everyone sees what is at the end of the fork.” The title was suggested by Burroughs's friend Jack Kerouac. The novel is a particularly grand illustration of Burroughs's skill with dialogue. Poet Allen Ginsberg, Burroughs' close friend and sometime lover, refers to Naked Lunch in his introduction to his epic poem "Howl".

The book contains what is generally considered to be some of Burroughs' most memorable and quoted passages. One of the most quoted is a section (or, to use Burroughs' terminology, a "routine") known as "The Talking Asshole". This story-within-a-story involves a man who teaches his anal orifice to talk, a trick he soon regrets when it develops a personality and mind of its own and eventually takes over the man's body. The man is eventually incapable of doing anything other than consuming and excreting, becoming an "all-purpose blob." The anecdote serves as a symbol of material consumerism, which, like a man teaching his asshole to talk started with good intentions but ultimately ended in lobotomizing the population. The man is eventually stripped of his free-will, doubt, and reasoning, and can only serve as a more efficient consumer. The man is to represent society, who's been offered hopeful capitalism at the expense of being brainwashed by the media in order to forward the capital. Notable recordings and performances of this routine include Frank Zappa reading it during 1978's The Nova Convention (it was recorded and released by Giorno Poetry Systems), by Burroughs himself in his mid-1990s CD Spare Ass Annie and Other Tales, and it is quoted virtually verbatim by Peter Weller's character in the film version of Naked Lunch.

Several characters would reappear in many later works, most notably the surgeon Dr. Benway, Clem Snide "the Private Asshole", and Inspector Lee. In 1989, Burroughs published Interzone, a collection of short stories and other writings including a chapter entitled "WORD" that at one time was considered for inclusion in Naked Lunch. According to some sources, Burroughs original title for the novel Naked Lunch was also Interzone.

[edit] Interpretation

The redeeming literary merit of the work is found in the biting satire and social criticism many of these episodes contain. Burroughs digests the modern American mind and spits out a wild, almost repulsive parade of images and characters that encapsulate the current state of the 20th century. From the seedy abortionist who solicits pregnant women on the street, to the racist County Clerk who represents rural intolerance, to the macho father who buys a prostitute for his fifteen year old son on his birthday, only to discover the kid literally got a "piece of ass", Naked Lunch exposes the under workings of the American experience, and shows the beginnings of a social pathology and hypocrisy that would erupt in the 1960s as a 'culture war'. Burroughs himself found the material disturbing to write, but also a cleansing of his life-long frustrations and unconsciously repressed experiences.

On a more specific level, Naked Lunch protests the death penalty. In Burroughs' Deposition: A Testiomony Concerning A Sickness, perhaps the most shocking and pornographic section of the book, "the Blue Movies" (appearing in the vignette A.J.'s Annual Party) is deemed "a tract against capital punishment." Within "the Blue Movies," three overtly sexual adolescents take part in hanging one another, wherein Burroughs lewdly mocks by incorporating auto-erotic asphyxiation.

Using believable metaphors representing addiction (most notably heroin, along with medical practice [Benway resorting to subway abortions after having his license revoked] and even homosexuality), Burroughs repudiates America's consumerist post-World War II state, and the overall human addiction to control. Unfortunately because of its absurdity and strong drug content, many readers misinterperet Naked Lunch as merely a drug novel written by a delusional addict.

The Junky's Christmas is a 1993 short claymation film directed by Nick Donkin and Melodie McDaniel. William S. Burroughs wrote the story and narrates the film. The story originally appeared in the 1989 collection Interzone and the recording of Burroughs reading the story was also released on the CD Spare Ass Annie and Other Tales.

The film was produced by Francis Ford Coppola. The film is scheduled for DVD release in North America on Nov. 21, 2006.[1]