Dr.
Adolfo Vásquez Rocca
William
S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
RESUMEN:
En
la obra de William Burroughs el sujeto se encuentra manipulado y
transformado por los procesos de contagio. El lenguaje es un virus
que se reproduce con gran facilidad y condiciona cualquier actividad
humana, dando cuenta de su intoxicada naturaleza. Los textos de
Burroughs proliferan sin principio ni fin como una plaga, se
reproducen y alargan en sentidos imprevisibles, son el producto de
una hibridación de muy diversos registros que no tienen nada que ver
con una evolución literaria tradicional, sus diferentes elementos
ignoran la progresión de la narración y aparecen a la deriva
desestructurando las novelas de su marco temporal, de su coexistencia
espacial, de su significado, y posibilitando que sea el lector quien
acabe por estructurarlas según sus propios deseos. Ante esta
situación vírica que Burroughs considera que impregna la
existencia, el escritor entiende que nuestro fin es el caos.El caos
como un espacio mítico donde reina lo híbrido, la fusión de lo
contradictorio, el doble monstruoso. La función del caos en la
escritura será una fascinación por los residuos, por el flujo
verbal que nos lleva al hundimiento y a la perdida, por el retorno al
silencio. La aspiración será “Encontrar un lenguaje endémico,
caótico, que sea un lenguaje del cuerpo, que se convierta entonces
en el fin reconocido de la escritura”
Dr.
ADOLFO VÁSQUEZ ROCCA
EL SUJETO DE LAS ADICCIONES
ERRANCIA, La palabra Inconclusa, Nº 9 - 2014, Monográfico –Elsujeto de las adicciones–, Revista de Psicoanálisis, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México UNAM.
William
S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
- Vásquez
Rocca, Adolfo, “William
S. Burroughs y Jacques Derrida; Literatura parasitaria y Cultura
Replicante: Del virus del Lenguaje a la Psicotopografía del Texto”,
En ERRANCIA, La palabra Inconclusa, Nº 9 - 2014, Monográfico –El
sujeto de las adicciones–, Revista de Psicoanálisis, Universidad
Nacional Autónoma de México UNAM.
William
S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
- VÁSQUEZ
ROCCA, Adolfo, “WILLIAM
S. BURROUGHS Y JACQUES DERRIDA; LITERATURA PARASITARIA Y CULTURA
REPLICANTE: DEL VIRUS DEL LENGUAJE A LA PSICOTOPOGRAFÍA DEL TEXTO”,
En ERRANCIA, La palabra Inconclusa, Nº 9 - 2014, Monográfico –El
sujeto de las adicciones–, Revista de Psicoanálisis, Universidad
Nacional Autónoma de México UNAM.
ERRANCIA
NÚMERO NUEVE
EL
SUJETO DE LAS ADICCIONES
AcademiaEdu
Dr.
Adolfo Vásquez Rocca
William
S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
"Emitir
no
puede
ser
nunca
mas
que
un
medio
para
emitir
más,
como
la
Droga.
Trate
usted
de
utilizar
la
droga
como
medio
para
otra
cosa
(...)
Al
emisor
no
le
gusta
la
charla.
El
emisor
no
es
un
ser
humano
(...)
Es
el
Virus
Humano."
W.
S.
Burroughs
Desperté
de la Enfermedad a los cuarenta y cinco años, sereno, cuerdo y en
bastante buen estado de salud, a no ser por un hígado algo resentido
y ese aspecto de llevar la carne de prestado que tienen todos los que
sobreviven a la Enfermedad... La mayoría de esos supervivientes no
recuerdan su delirio con detalle. Al parecer, yo tomé notas
detalladas sobre la Enfermedad y el delirio.
W.
S.
Burroughs
La
droga es el producto ideal... la mercancía definitiva. No hace falta
literatura para vender. El cliente se arrastrará por una
alcantarilla para suplicar que le vendan... El comerciante de droga
no vende su producto al consumidor, vende el consumidor a su
producto. No mejora ni simplifica su mercancía. Degrada y simplifica
al cliente. Paga a sus empleados en droga.
W.
S.
Burroughs
La
droga produce una fórmula básica de virus “maligno”: El álgebra
de la necesidad. El rostro del «mal» es siempre el rostro de la
necesidad total. El drogadicto es un hombre con una necesidad
absoluta de droga. A partir de cierta frecuencia, la necesidad no
conoce límite ni control alguno. Con palabras de necesidad total:
«¿Estás dispuesto?» Sí, lo estás. Estás dispuesto a mentir,
engañar, denunciar a tus amigos, robar, hacer lo que sea para
satisfacer esa necesidad total. Porque estarás en un estado de
enfermedad total, de posesión total, imposibilitado para hacer
cualquier otra cosa. Los drogadictos son enfermos que no pueden
actuar más que como actúan. Un perro rabioso no puede sino morder.
Adoptar una actitud puritana no conduce a nada, salvo que se pretenda
mantener el virus en funcionamiento.
W.
S.
Burroughs
William
S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
AcademiaEdu
Dr.
Adolfo Vásquez Rocca
1.-
La
metáfora
viral.
La
o La obra de William
Burroughs
es un informe sobre sus viajes a un mundo psicodélico y mutante,
donde la condición del hombre está definida por sus adicciones
(tanto al poder como a las drogas) y donde nuestra especie está en
proceso de mutación hacía otra forma poshumana.
William
S. Burroughs fue un sobreviviente. Paranoico y genial. Novelista,
drogadicto e ícono cool. Aunque también su figura ostenta otras
etiquetas: la de padre del punk, la de homosexual, la de pintor, la
de ensayista, la de amante de las armas, la de autor postmodernista,
la de figura primaria de la generación Beat, entre unas cuantas más,
como místico, teórico de los medios, gurú de la ciencia ficción,
etc. Cualquiera de ellas puede funcionar bien como una puerta de
entrada a su mundo.
En
en
la
obra
de
William
Burroughs
el
sujeto
se
encuentra
manipulado
y
transformado
por
los
procesos
de
contagio.
El
lenguaje
es
un
virus
que
se
reproduce
con
gran
facilidad
y
condiciona
cualquier
actividad
humana,
dando
cuenta
de
su
intoxicada
naturaleza.
Los
textos
de
Burroughs
proliferan
sin
principio
ni
fin
como
una
plaga,
se
reproducen
y
alargan
en
sentidos
imprevisibles,
son
el
producto
de
una
hibridación
de
muy
diversos
registros
que
no
tienen
nada
que
ver
con
una
evolución
literaria
tradicional,
sus
diferentes
elementos
ignoran
la
progresión
de
la
narración
y
aparecen
a
la
deriva
desestructurando
las
novelas
de
su
marco
temporal,
de
su
coexistencia
espacial,
de
su
significado,
y
posibilitando
que
sea
el
lector
quien
acabe
por
estructurarlas
según
sus
propios
deseos.
En
el
contexto
de
esta
escritura
laberíntica
en
la
que
corremos
el
riesgo
del
extravío
del
autor
perdido
en
el
texto
o
por
los
constantes
y
expansivos
comentarios,
estamos
ante
la
idea
del
texto
como
tejido
en
perpetuo
urdimiento,
como
un
tejido
que
se
hace,
se
traba
a
sí
mismo
y
deshace
al
sujeto
en
su
textura:
una
araña
tal
que
se
disolvería
ella
misma
en
las
secreciones
constructivas
de
su
tela.
Así
William
Burroughs
viene
a
ser
el
precursor
de
la
deriva,
en
el
sentido
situ
de
dérive
y
en
la
definición
de
Lyotard
de
driftwork.
A
partir
de
los
textos
de
Burroughs
es
posible
prever
una
geografía
enteramente
nueva,
una
especie
de
mapa
de
peregrinaciones
en
el
que
los
lugares
sagrados
se
han
reemplazado
con
experiencias
dromo-literarias:
una
verdadera
ciencia
de
la
psicotopografía.
2.-
Parásitos, lectura deconstructiva e historias de amor triste
Vivimos
un momento no sólo sospechoso sino también generador de otras
tantas incertidumbres, como las que recaen sobre los procesos
significativos. El escepticismo postmoderno, descree radicalmente ya
no –como es obvio– de la verdad, sino de la posibilidad de
interpretaciones validas o más bien validadas de acuerdo a un
criterio externo o distinto a la ficcionalización de los relatos,1
lecturas intencionadas y maliciosas de los textos o –como bien dirá
Derrida– ante sobreinterpretaciones, recuérdese que –“una
buena traducción debe ser abusiva”.2
Las sospechas a este respecto son razonables, si se tiene en cuenta
que la cultura actúa como una cadena de textos que por una parte se
instruyen mutuamente y, por otra, están en desplazamiento
constante.3
La
estrategia de desplazar, diferir, des-estructurar, diseminar, son
propias de una lectura deconstructiva, una lectura –en apariencia–
parasitaria.
La
lectura deconstructiva de una obra dada sería simple y llanamente un
parásito de la lectura obvia o unívoca. Como en el caso de una cita
de una cita como ejemplo del tipo de cadena que pretendemos auscultar
aquí. ¿Es la cita un parásito intruso dentro del cuerpo del texto
principal, o es el texto interpretativo el parásito que rodea y
estrangula a la cita, su anfitrión? El anfitrión alimenta al
parásito y hace posible su vida pero, al mismo tiempo, es aniquilado
por él tal como se acostumbra decir que la crítica mata a la
literatura.4
1A
modo de esbozo de una teoría literaria –de la creación de
entidades ficcionales, mundos y tramas dentro del texto– podemos
caracterizar la naturaleza del relato de ficción como un mundo
posible ceñido a las normas constitutivas de la lógica modal. Este
modelo ofrecerá las respuestas a problemas como la relación entre
el mundo real y el dominio semántico del texto de ficción, o la
posibilidad de hacer declaraciones sobre la función de verdad en
los universos de la ficción.
2DERRIDA,
Jacques, La
deconstrucción en las fronteras de la Filosofía: La retirada de la
metáfora, Editorial
Paidós, Barcelona, 1989.
3VÁSQUEZ
ROCCA, Adolfo, Postmodernidad
y sobreinterpretación. Lecturas paranoicas y métodos obsesivos de
interpretación;
En NÓMADAS. 11 | Enero-Junio.2005. Revista Crítica de Ciencias
Sociales y Jurídicas. UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE
MADRID.http://www.ucm.es/info/nomadas/11/avrocca1.htm
4
MILLER, J. Hillis, "El crítico como
huésped", en Deconstrucción y
crítica, Siglo XXI editores,
México, 2003, p. 211 – 212
Vásquez
Rocca, Adolfo,“William
S. Burroughs y Jacques Derrida; Literatura parasitaria y Cultura
Replicante: Del virus del Lenguaje a la Psicotopografía del Texto”,
En ERRANCIA, La palabra Inconclusa, Nº 9 - 2014
Dr.
Adolfo
Vásquez
Rocca
.D.+_+Los+dominios+perdidos+2.0+.jpeg)
Adolfo Vásquez Rocca Doctor en Filosofía
Adolfo Vasquez Rocca - Universidad Complutense de Madrid
Doctor en Filosofía Pontificia Universidad
Católica de Valparaíso y Universidad Complutense de Madrid.
Profesor de la Escuela de Psicología de la UNAB. –Miembro del
Consejo Editorial Internacional de 'Reflexiones Marginales' –Revista
de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras UNAM. –Miembro del Consejo
Editorial Internacional de Errancia, Revista de Psicoanálisis,
Teoría Crítica y Cultura –UNAM– Universidad Nacional Autónoma
de México. – Director de Revista Observaciones Filosóficas.
Profesor visitante en la Maestría en Filosofía de la Benemérita
Universidad Autónoma de Puebla. –Profesor Asociado al Grupo
Theoria – Proyecto europeo de Investigaciones de Postgrado –UCM.
Eastern Mediterranean University - Academia.edu. Académico
Investigador de la Vicerrectoría de Investigación y Postgrado,
Universidad Andrés Bello. –Investigador Asociado de la Escuela
Matríztica de Santiago –dirigida por el Dr. Humberto Maturana.
Consultor Experto del Consejo Nacional de Innovación para la
Competitividad (CNIC)– Ha publicado el Libro: Peter Sloterdijk;
Esferas, helada cósmica y políticas de climatización, Colección
Novatores, Nº 28, Editorial de la Institución Alfons el Magnànim
(IAM), Valencia, España, 2008. Invitado especial a la
International Conference de la Trienal de Arquitectura de Lisboa |
Lisbon Architecture Triennale 2011.Profesor de Postgrado, Magister en
Biología-Cultural, Escuela Matríztica de Santiago y Universidad
Mayor 2014
Adolfo Vásquez Rocca Arte y Filosofía
Doctor en Filosofía por la Pontificia Universidad
Católica de Valparaíso; Postgrado Universidad Complutense de Madrid,
Departamento de Filosofía IV. Profesor de Postgrado del Instituto de
Filosofía de la Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso; Profesor
de Antropología y Estética en el Departamento de Artes y Humanidades de
la Universidad Andrés Bello UNAB. Profesor de la Escuela de Periodismo
y Arquitectura UNAB Santiago. – En octubre de 2006 y 2007 es invitado
por la ‘Fundación Hombre y Mundo’ y la UNAM a dictar un Ciclo de
Conferencias en México. – Miembro del Consejo Editorial Internacional
de la ‘Fundación Ética Mundial‘ de México. Director del Consejo Consultivo Internacional de ‘Konvergencias‘, Revista de Filosofía y Culturas en Diálogo, Argentina. Miembro del Conselho Editorial da Humanidades em Revista, Universidade Regional do Noroeste do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul, Brasil y del Cuerpo Editorial de Sophia –Revista de Filosofía de la Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador– . Director de Revista Observaciones Filosóficas. Profesor visitante en la Maestría en Filosofía de la Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla. – Profesor visitante Florida Christian University USA y Profesor Asociado al Grupo Theoria –Proyecto europeo de Investigaciones de Postgrado– UCM. Académico Investigador de la Vicerrectoría de Investigación y Postgrado, Universidad Andrés Bello. Artista conceptual. Ha publicado el Libro: Peter Sloterdijk; Esferas, helada cósmica y políticas de climatización,
Colección Novatores, Nº 28, Editorial de la Institución Alfons el
Magnànim (IAM), Valencia, España, 2008. Invitado especial a la
International Conference de la Trienal de Arquitectura de Lisboa | Lisbon Architecture Triennale 2011
Contacto
Web: www.danoex.net/adolfovasquezrocca.html
Academia.edu: emui.academia.edu/AdolfoVasquezRocca
Eastern Mediterranean University
E-mail: adolfovrocca@gmail.com
Linkedin: linkedin.com/pub/adolfo-vasquez-rocca/25/502/21a
Academia.edu: emui.academia.edu/AdolfoVasquezRocca
Eastern Mediterranean University
E-mail: adolfovrocca@gmail.com
Linkedin: linkedin.com/pub/adolfo-vasquez-rocca/25/502/21a
Domicilio
Valparaíso,
Chile
Adscripción Académica
Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso
Universidad Andrés Bello UNAB
Universidad Complutense de Madrid
Eastern Mediterranean University - Academia.edu
Universidad Andrés Bello UNAB
Universidad Complutense de Madrid
Eastern Mediterranean University - Academia.edu
Trayectoria Académica
Doctor
en Filosofía por la Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso;
Postgrado Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Departamento de Filosofía
IV, mención Filosofía Contemporánea y Estética.
Profesor de Postgrado del Instituto de Filosofía de la Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso; Profesor de Antropología y Estética en el Departamento de Artes y Humanidades de la Universidad Andrés Bello UNAB. Profesor de la Escuela de Periodismo, Profesor Adjunto Escuela de Psicología y de la Facultad de Arquitectura UNAB Santiago. Profesor PEL Programa Especial de Licenciatura en Diseño, UNAB – DUOC UC.
En octubre de 2006 y 2007 es invitado por la 'Fundación Hombre y Mundo' y la UNAM a dictar un Ciclo de Conferencias en México.
Miembro del Consejo Editorial Internacional de la 'Fundación Ética Mundial' de México. Director del Consejo Consultivo Internacional de 'Konvergencias', Revista de Filosofía y Culturas en Diálogo, Argentina. Miembro del Consejo Editorial Internacional de Revista Praxis. Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Universidad Nacional UNA, Costa Rica. Miembro del Conselho Editorial da Humanidades em Revista, Universidade Regional do Noroeste do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul, Brasil y del Cuerpo Editorial de Sophia –Revista de Filosofía de la Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador–. –Secretario Ejecutivo de Revista Philosophica PUCV.
Asesor Consultivo de Enfocarte –Revista de Arte y Literatura– Cataluña / Gijón, Asturias, España. –Miembro del Consejo Editorial Internacional de 'Reflexiones Marginales' –Revista de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras UNAM. –Editor Asociado de Societarts, Revista de artes y humanidades, adscrita a la Universidad Autónoma de Baja California. –Miembro del Comité Editorial de International Journal of Safety and Security in Tourism and Hospitality, publicación científica de la Universidad de Palermo. –Miembro Titular del Consejo Editorial Internacional de Errancia, Revista de Psicoanálisis, Teoría Crítica y Cultura –UNAM– Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. –Miembro del Consejo Editorial de Revista “Campos en Ciencias Sociales”, Universidad Santo Tomás © , Bogotá, Colombia.
Miembro de la Federación Internacional de Archivos Fílmicos (FIAF) con sede en Bruselas, Bélgica. Director de Revista Observaciones Filosóficas. Profesor visitante en la Maestría en Filosofía de la Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla. – Profesor visitante Florida Christian University USA y Profesor Asociado al Grupo Theoria – Proyecto europeo de Investigaciones de Postgrado –UCM. Eastern Mediterranean University - Academia.edu. Académico Investigador de la Vicerrectoría de Investigación y Postgrado, Universidad Andrés Bello. –Investigador Asociado y Profesor adjunto de la Escuela Matríztica de Santiago –dirigida por el Dr. Humberto Maturana. Consultor Experto del Consejo Nacional de Innovación para la Competitividad (CNIC)– Artista conceptual. Crítico de Arte. Ha publicado el Libro: Peter Sloterdijk; Esferas, helada cósmica y políticas de climatización, Colección Novatores, Nº 28, Editorial de la Institución Alfons el Magnànim (IAM), Valencia, España, 2008. Invitado especial a la International Conference de la Trienal de Arquitectura de Lisboa | Lisbon Architecture Triennale 2011. Traducido al Francés - Publicado en la sección Architecture de la Anthologie: Le Néant Dans la Pensée Contemporaine . Publications du Centre Français d'Iconologie Comparée CFIC, Bès Editions , París, © 2012. Profesor de Postgrado, Magister en Biología-Cultural, Escuela Matríztica de Santiago y Universidad Mayor 2013.- 2014
Profesor de Postgrado del Instituto de Filosofía de la Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso; Profesor de Antropología y Estética en el Departamento de Artes y Humanidades de la Universidad Andrés Bello UNAB. Profesor de la Escuela de Periodismo, Profesor Adjunto Escuela de Psicología y de la Facultad de Arquitectura UNAB Santiago. Profesor PEL Programa Especial de Licenciatura en Diseño, UNAB – DUOC UC.
En octubre de 2006 y 2007 es invitado por la 'Fundación Hombre y Mundo' y la UNAM a dictar un Ciclo de Conferencias en México.
Miembro del Consejo Editorial Internacional de la 'Fundación Ética Mundial' de México. Director del Consejo Consultivo Internacional de 'Konvergencias', Revista de Filosofía y Culturas en Diálogo, Argentina. Miembro del Consejo Editorial Internacional de Revista Praxis. Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Universidad Nacional UNA, Costa Rica. Miembro del Conselho Editorial da Humanidades em Revista, Universidade Regional do Noroeste do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul, Brasil y del Cuerpo Editorial de Sophia –Revista de Filosofía de la Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador–. –Secretario Ejecutivo de Revista Philosophica PUCV.
Asesor Consultivo de Enfocarte –Revista de Arte y Literatura– Cataluña / Gijón, Asturias, España. –Miembro del Consejo Editorial Internacional de 'Reflexiones Marginales' –Revista de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras UNAM. –Editor Asociado de Societarts, Revista de artes y humanidades, adscrita a la Universidad Autónoma de Baja California. –Miembro del Comité Editorial de International Journal of Safety and Security in Tourism and Hospitality, publicación científica de la Universidad de Palermo. –Miembro Titular del Consejo Editorial Internacional de Errancia, Revista de Psicoanálisis, Teoría Crítica y Cultura –UNAM– Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. –Miembro del Consejo Editorial de Revista “Campos en Ciencias Sociales”, Universidad Santo Tomás © , Bogotá, Colombia.
Miembro de la Federación Internacional de Archivos Fílmicos (FIAF) con sede en Bruselas, Bélgica. Director de Revista Observaciones Filosóficas. Profesor visitante en la Maestría en Filosofía de la Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla. – Profesor visitante Florida Christian University USA y Profesor Asociado al Grupo Theoria – Proyecto europeo de Investigaciones de Postgrado –UCM. Eastern Mediterranean University - Academia.edu. Académico Investigador de la Vicerrectoría de Investigación y Postgrado, Universidad Andrés Bello. –Investigador Asociado y Profesor adjunto de la Escuela Matríztica de Santiago –dirigida por el Dr. Humberto Maturana. Consultor Experto del Consejo Nacional de Innovación para la Competitividad (CNIC)– Artista conceptual. Crítico de Arte. Ha publicado el Libro: Peter Sloterdijk; Esferas, helada cósmica y políticas de climatización, Colección Novatores, Nº 28, Editorial de la Institución Alfons el Magnànim (IAM), Valencia, España, 2008. Invitado especial a la International Conference de la Trienal de Arquitectura de Lisboa | Lisbon Architecture Triennale 2011. Traducido al Francés - Publicado en la sección Architecture de la Anthologie: Le Néant Dans la Pensée Contemporaine . Publications du Centre Français d'Iconologie Comparée CFIC, Bès Editions , París, © 2012. Profesor de Postgrado, Magister en Biología-Cultural, Escuela Matríztica de Santiago y Universidad Mayor 2013.- 2014
Publicaciones
- Ver todas las publicaciones →
(2014)
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "Lógica
paraconsistente, paradojas y lecturas parasitarias: Del virus del
lenguaje a las lógicas difusas, (Lewis Carroll, B. Russell, K. Gödel y
W. S. Burroughs)", En EIKASIA, Revista de Filosofía, Nº 58 – 2014, Sociedad Asturiana de Filosofía SAF, Oviedo, España, pp. 41– 64.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Nietzsche y Freud, negociación, culpa y crueldad: las pulsiones y sus destinos, eros y thanatos (agresividad y destructividad)”, En EIKASIA Nº 57, 2014, Revista de Filosofía, Oviedo, SAF - Sociedad Asturiana de Filosofía.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "Sloterdijk: el retorno de la religión, la lucha de los monoteísmos históricos y el asedio a jerusalén; Psicopolítica de los bancos de ira, apocalipsis y relatos escatológicos; del fundamentalismo islámico a los espectros de Marx". En Revista Almiar - III Época Nº 75 - 2014, ISSN: 1696-4807, MARGEN CERO, Madrid.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Freud y Kafka: Criminales por sentimiento de culpabilidad: En torno a la crueldad, el sabotaje y la auto-destructividad humana”, En EIKASIA, Revista de la Sociedad Asturiana de Filosofía SAF, Nº 55 – marzo, 2014 - ISSN 1885-5679 – Oviedo, España, pp. 73 – 92.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Zoología Política: Disturbios en el Parque Humano, Cultura de Masas y el modelo amigable de la Sociedad Literaria”, En Revista Almiar, MARGEN CERO, Madrid, III Época – Nº 73 marzo–abril, 2014.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Peter Sloterdijk: Constitución Psico-inmunitaria de la naturaleza humana, Ciencia Zoológica y Ciencia Pneumática; Deriva biotecnológica e historia espiritual de la criatura”, En Academia.edu, Manuscritos Transversales, 2014, pp. 45–66; y Cuaderno de Materiales, ISSN: 1139-4382, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Nº 26, 2014.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Nietzsche y Freud, negociación, culpa y crueldad: las pulsiones y sus destinos, eros y thanatos (agresividad y destructividad)”, En EIKASIA Nº 57, 2014, Revista de Filosofía, Oviedo, SAF - Sociedad Asturiana de Filosofía.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "Sloterdijk: el retorno de la religión, la lucha de los monoteísmos históricos y el asedio a jerusalén; Psicopolítica de los bancos de ira, apocalipsis y relatos escatológicos; del fundamentalismo islámico a los espectros de Marx". En Revista Almiar - III Época Nº 75 - 2014, ISSN: 1696-4807, MARGEN CERO, Madrid.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Freud y Kafka: Criminales por sentimiento de culpabilidad: En torno a la crueldad, el sabotaje y la auto-destructividad humana”, En EIKASIA, Revista de la Sociedad Asturiana de Filosofía SAF, Nº 55 – marzo, 2014 - ISSN 1885-5679 – Oviedo, España, pp. 73 – 92.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Zoología Política: Disturbios en el Parque Humano, Cultura de Masas y el modelo amigable de la Sociedad Literaria”, En Revista Almiar, MARGEN CERO, Madrid, III Época – Nº 73 marzo–abril, 2014.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Peter Sloterdijk: Constitución Psico-inmunitaria de la naturaleza humana, Ciencia Zoológica y Ciencia Pneumática; Deriva biotecnológica e historia espiritual de la criatura”, En Academia.edu, Manuscritos Transversales, 2014, pp. 45–66; y Cuaderno de Materiales, ISSN: 1139-4382, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Nº 26, 2014.
(2013)
Vásquez
Rocca, Adolfo, "Arte
Conceptual y Posconceptual. La idea como arte: Duchamp, Beuys, Cage y
Fluxus",
En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas -
UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID, Nómadas Nº 37 |
Enero-Junio 2013 (I), pp. 100 -
130.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Peter Sloterdijk: El animal acrobático, prácticas antropotécnicas y diseño de lo humano”, En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas - UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID, NÓMADAS. Nº 39 | Julio-Diciembre, 2013 (I) pp. 100-125.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, " Foucault; 'Los Anormales', una Genealogía de lo Monstruoso; Apuntes para una Historiografía de la Locura.", En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas - UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID, —NÓMADAS. Nº 34 – 2012 (2), pp. 403 - 420
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "Sloterdijk: Neuroglobalización, estresores y prácticas psico-inmunológicas", En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas - UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID, Nómadas Nº 35 | Julio-Diciembre.2012 - 2013 (I), pp. 427 - 457
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Peter Sloterdijk: Experimentos con uno mismo. Ensayos de intoxicación voluntaria y constitución psicoinmunitaria de la naturaleza humana”, REVISTA DE ANTROPOLOGÍA EXPERIMENTAL, Nº 13, 2013 - pp. 323-340 - ISSN: 1578-4282, UNIVERSIDAD DE JAÉN (España).
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "Peter Sloterdijk: Celo de Dios, neo-expresionismo islámico y política exterior norteamericana", EIKASIA, Revista de la Sociedad Asturiana de Filosofía SAF, Nº 53 – diciembre, 2013 - ISSN 1885-5679 – Oviedo, España, pp. 23 – 40.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Peter Sloterdijk: El animal acrobático, prácticas antropotécnicas y diseño de lo humano”, En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas - UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID, NÓMADAS. Nº 39 | Julio-Diciembre, 2013 (I) pp. 100-125.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, " Foucault; 'Los Anormales', una Genealogía de lo Monstruoso; Apuntes para una Historiografía de la Locura.", En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas - UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID, —NÓMADAS. Nº 34 – 2012 (2), pp. 403 - 420
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "Sloterdijk: Neuroglobalización, estresores y prácticas psico-inmunológicas", En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas - UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID, Nómadas Nº 35 | Julio-Diciembre.2012 - 2013 (I), pp. 427 - 457
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Peter Sloterdijk: Experimentos con uno mismo. Ensayos de intoxicación voluntaria y constitución psicoinmunitaria de la naturaleza humana”, REVISTA DE ANTROPOLOGÍA EXPERIMENTAL, Nº 13, 2013 - pp. 323-340 - ISSN: 1578-4282, UNIVERSIDAD DE JAÉN (España).
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "Peter Sloterdijk: Celo de Dios, neo-expresionismo islámico y política exterior norteamericana", EIKASIA, Revista de la Sociedad Asturiana de Filosofía SAF, Nº 53 – diciembre, 2013 - ISSN 1885-5679 – Oviedo, España, pp. 23 – 40.
Libros
Libro: Peter
Sloterdijk; Esferas, helada cósmica y políticas de climatización,
Colección Novatores, Nº 28, Editorial de la Institución Alfons el
Magnànim (IAM), Valencia, España, 2008. 221 páginas | I.S.B.N.: 978-84-7822-523-1
Libro: Rorty: el Giro narrativo de la Ética o la Filosofía como género literario [Compilación de Conferencias en México D.F.] Editorial Hombre y Mundo (H & M), México, 2009, 450 páginas I.S.B.N.: 978-3-7800-520-1
Libro: Rorty: el Giro narrativo de la Ética o la Filosofía como género literario [Compilación de Conferencias en México D.F.] Editorial Hombre y Mundo (H & M), México, 2009, 450 páginas I.S.B.N.: 978-3-7800-520-1
DOAJ → Directory of Open Access Journals
DIALNET → Directorio de Publicaciones Científicas Hispanoamericanas
Publications Scientific →
Biblioteket og Aarhus Universitet, Denmark | Det Humanistiske Fakultet →
Biblioteca Universia → Unesco - CSIC
Biblioteca UCM → Universidad Complutense de Madrid
Biblioteca Asociación Filosófica UI →
Eastern Mediterranean University - Academia.edu
Publicaciones Indexadas en Revista Nómadas
VÁSQUEZ ROCCA, Adolfo, "SLOTERDIJK: NEUROGLOBALIZACIÓN, ESTRESORES Y PRÁCTICAS PSICO-INMUNOLÓGICAS",
En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas -
UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID, Nómadas Nº 35 | Julio-Diciembre.2012 -
2013 (I), pp. 427 - 457http://www.theoria.eu/nomadas/35/adolfovrocca.pdf
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Peter
Sloterdijk: Experimentos con uno mismo. Ensayos de intoxicación
voluntaria y constitución psicoinmunitaria de la naturaleza humana”, En ARTEFACTO -Pensamientos sobre la Técnica- UBA, abril, 2013
http://www.revista-artefacto.com.ar/pdf_textos/84.pdf
http://www.revista-artefacto.com.ar/pdf_textos/84.pdf
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Sloterdijk:
La Comuna Exhalada, hacia una Filosofía de la levedad. La Escena
Originaria de la tradición judeocristiana: La creación del hombre”, En Espiral Nº 44 - 2013, Revista de Cultura y Pensamiento Contemporáneo, Tijuana, BC. México.
http://www.revistaespiral.org/espiral_44/filosofia_adolfo.html
http://www.revistaespiral.org/espiral_44/filosofia_adolfo.html
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Nietzsche:
De la voluntad de ficción a la voluntad de poder; Aproximación
estético-epistemológica a la concepción biológica de lo literario”, En ROSEBUD – Critica, scrittura, giornalismo online - Anno III, DUBLIN, IRELAND, Septiembre, 2013.
http://rinabrundu.com/2013/09/04/nietzsche-de-la-voluntad-de-ficcion-a-la-voluntad-de-poder-aproximacion-estetico-epistemologica-a-la-concepcion-biologica-de-lo-literario/
http://rinabrundu.com/2013/09/04/nietzsche-de-la-voluntad-de-ficcion-a-la-voluntad-de-poder-aproximacion-estetico-epistemologica-a-la-concepcion-biologica-de-lo-literario/
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Peter Sloterdijk: El animal acrobático, prácticas antropotécnicas y diseño de lo humano”,
En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas -
UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID, NÓMADAS. Nº 39 | Julio-Diciembre,
2013 (I) pp. 100-125
http://pendientedemigracion.ucm.es/info/nomadas/39/adolfovrocca_es.pdf
http://pendientedemigracion.ucm.es/info/nomadas/39/adolfovrocca_es.pdf
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “Peter
Sloterdijk: Experimentos con uno mismo. Ensayos de intoxicación
voluntaria y constitución psicoinmunitaria de la naturaleza humana”, REVISTA DE ANTROPOLOGÍA EXPERIMENTAL, Nº 13, 2013 - pp. 323-340 - ISSN: 1578-4282, UNIVERSIDAD DE JAÉN (España).
http://www.ujaen.es/huesped/rae/articulos2013/21vasquez13.pdf
http://www.ujaen.es/huesped/rae/articulos2013/21vasquez13.pdf
Adolfo Vásquez Rocca Doctor en Filosofía
ADOLFO VÁSQUEZ ROCCA PH.D. - CURRICULUM ACADÉMICO
Eastern Mediterranean University - Academia.edu
Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso
Universidad Complutense de Madrid
Universidad Andrés Bello UNAB
E-mail: adolfovrocca@gmail.com
PAPELES___ MANUSCRITOS___DIARIOS__TESIS ___CUADERNOS __BORRADORES Y PRÓLOGOS___FILOSOFÍA, ARTE Y NOTAS AL MARGEN ___DR. ADOLFO VÁSQUEZ ROCCA
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "Lógica paraconsistente, paradojas y lecturas parasitarias: Del virus del lenguaje a las lógicas difusas, (Lewis Carroll, B. Russell, K. Gödel y W. S. Burroughs)", En EIKASIA, Revista de Filosofía, Nº 58 – 2014, Sociedad Asturiana de Filosofía SAF, Oviedo, España, pp. 41– 64.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “William Burroughs: Literatura ectoplasmoide y mutaciones antropológicas. Del virus del lenguaje a la psicotopografía del texto”,
En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas -
Universidad Complutense de Madrid, NÓMADAS. 26 | Enero-Junio.2010 (II),
pp. 251-265. http://www.ucm.es/info/nomadas/26/avrocca2.pdf
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "La Metáfora Viral en William Burroughs; Postmodernidad, compulsión y
Literatura conspirativa"
En Qì Revista de pensamiento cultura y
creación, Año VII – Nº8, 2006, pp. 118 a 124,
UNIVERSIDAD CARLOS III DE MADRID (ESPAÑA, UE)http://www.margencero.com/articulos/new03/burroughs.html
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "W. Burroughs; La metáfora viral y sus mutaciones antropológicas"
En Almiar MARGEN CERO, Revista Fundadora de la ASOCIACIÓN DE
REVISTAS DIGITALES DE ESPAÑA - Nº 46 - 2009.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “William Burroughs. Metáfora Viral, compulsión y Literatura conspirativa”, En NÓMADAS, Revista Crítica de Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas - UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID, NÓMADAS.13 | Enero-Junio (2006.1) pp. 419-424
http://pendientedemigracion.ucm.es/info/nomadas/13/avrocca2.pdf
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, “La Metáfora Viral en William Burroughs; Posmodernidad, compulsión y Literatura conspirativa”, en NÓMADAS, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Nº 13 (2006.1), p. 419-424, Versión digital: <http://revistas.ucm.es/cps/15786730/articulos/NOMA0606120419A.PDF>
Y En Qì Revista de pensamiento cultura y creación, Año VII – Nº 8, 2006, pp. 118 a 124, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid.
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo, "W. Burroughs; La metáfora viral y sus mutaciones antropológicas"
En Almiar MARGEN CERO, Revista Fundadora de la ASOCIACIÓN DE
REVISTAS DIGITALES DE ESPAÑA - Nº 46 - 2009.
William
S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
BEAT WRITER'S GOT THE BEAT: William S. Burroughs Sings!
One of
the most unlikely stars of the late '70s-to-early '90s punk/college rock
days wasn't a musician at all, but a taciturn, elderly writer clad not
in flannel shirts and Doc Martens, but a three-piece suit, hat, and
cane. How a novelist with no musical background who began his career in
the 1940s became so popular an alternative music figure that Kurt
Cobaine backed him up on one of Cobain's last recordings is one
of the odder, more fascinating footnotes in this
otherwise heavily examined musical era.
William
S. Burroughs is, of course, one of the most celebrated figures in 20th
century literature due to his key participation in the "Beat" movement
that essentially dragged American letters into the modern era, rejecting
classical European/Shakespearean influences in an attempt to create a
literature as unique to the U.S. as jazz is to American music. And,
indeed, the cliche of the beatnik reciting stream-of-consciousness
poetry over cool jazz is the first thing that pops to mind when
considering the confluence of the Beats with music.
But Burroughs was never a beatnik. He was a junkie and heroin dealer who accidentally shot and killed his wife, traveled thru Latin America and Morocco, helped popularize North African trance ritual music, dismantled literature via his "cut-up" method of chopping up and rearranging pages of writings, was put on trial for obscenity, saw his son go to prison, saw his son die, was gay in the pre-Stonewall days, and co-created a "dream machine" said to create somewhat hallucinatory experiences when activated.
In other words, he'd been thru some shit. By the late '70s, he was back in the States and started giving public readings in his now impossibly craggy, deep, world-weary voice. This was to be his main source of income for the last years of his life. The downtown New York scene was receptive to both his writings and his voice, filled as it was with not only the weight and wisdom of a life you never led, but with an idiosyncratic rhythmic delivery. He left New York for Kansas in 1981, well on his way to becoming an icon of cool.
After a while, it wasn't enough to just listen to Burroughs read his own works, with increasingly elaborate musical backings, but to hire him to perform on other people's recordings. And that is what we have here: not Burroughs' own releases, but his various miscellaneous appearances on other bands' songs. Having Burroughs perform your music gave you instant hip cred, and gave a Bill a paycheck. As this article puts it, he was a rock star to rock stars. William S. Burroughs died in 1997, at age 83.
William S. Burroughs Sings
UPDATE 10/13: Also now up on ubu.web: http://www.ubu.com/sound/burroughs_sings.html
1. Star Me Kitten (with REM, from "Songs in the Key of X: Music from and Inspired by 'the X-Files'" - 1996)
2. Is Everybody In? (with The Doors, reciting Jim Morrison poetry, from "Stoned Immaculate: The Music of the Doors")
3. Sharkey's Night (with Laurie Anderson, from "Mister Heartbreak" - 1983)
4. What Keeps Mankind Alive (from Kurt Weill tribute album "September Songs")
5. 'T 'Aint No Sin (1920s jazz song, performed on Tom Waits' "The Black Rider" - 1993)
6. Quick Fix (w/Ministry, "Just One Fix" b-side - 1992)
7. Old Lady Sloan (w/The Eudoras, covering a song by a Lawrence, Kansas punk band from "The Mortal Micronotz Tribute!" - 1995
8. Ich Bin Von Kopf Bis Fub Auf Liebe Eingestellt (Falling In Love Again) - Marlene Deitrich cover, from "Dead City Radio" - 1988
William
S. Burroughs is, of course, one of the most celebrated figures in 20th
century literature due to his key participation in the "Beat" movement
that essentially dragged American letters into the modern era, rejecting
classical European/Shakespearean influences in an attempt to create a
literature as unique to the U.S. as jazz is to American music. And,
indeed, the cliche of the beatnik reciting stream-of-consciousness
poetry over cool jazz is the first thing that pops to mind when
considering the confluence of the Beats with music.But Burroughs was never a beatnik. He was a junkie and heroin dealer who accidentally shot and killed his wife, traveled thru Latin America and Morocco, helped popularize North African trance ritual music, dismantled literature via his "cut-up" method of chopping up and rearranging pages of writings, was put on trial for obscenity, saw his son go to prison, saw his son die, was gay in the pre-Stonewall days, and co-created a "dream machine" said to create somewhat hallucinatory experiences when activated.
In other words, he'd been thru some shit. By the late '70s, he was back in the States and started giving public readings in his now impossibly craggy, deep, world-weary voice. This was to be his main source of income for the last years of his life. The downtown New York scene was receptive to both his writings and his voice, filled as it was with not only the weight and wisdom of a life you never led, but with an idiosyncratic rhythmic delivery. He left New York for Kansas in 1981, well on his way to becoming an icon of cool.
After a while, it wasn't enough to just listen to Burroughs read his own works, with increasingly elaborate musical backings, but to hire him to perform on other people's recordings. And that is what we have here: not Burroughs' own releases, but his various miscellaneous appearances on other bands' songs. Having Burroughs perform your music gave you instant hip cred, and gave a Bill a paycheck. As this article puts it, he was a rock star to rock stars. William S. Burroughs died in 1997, at age 83.
William S. Burroughs Sings
UPDATE 10/13: Also now up on ubu.web: http://www.ubu.com/sound/burroughs_sings.html
1. Star Me Kitten (with REM, from "Songs in the Key of X: Music from and Inspired by 'the X-Files'" - 1996)
2. Is Everybody In? (with The Doors, reciting Jim Morrison poetry, from "Stoned Immaculate: The Music of the Doors")
3. Sharkey's Night (with Laurie Anderson, from "Mister Heartbreak" - 1983)
4. What Keeps Mankind Alive (from Kurt Weill tribute album "September Songs")
5. 'T 'Aint No Sin (1920s jazz song, performed on Tom Waits' "The Black Rider" - 1993)
6. Quick Fix (w/Ministry, "Just One Fix" b-side - 1992)
7. Old Lady Sloan (w/The Eudoras, covering a song by a Lawrence, Kansas punk band from "The Mortal Micronotz Tribute!" - 1995
8. Ich Bin Von Kopf Bis Fub Auf Liebe Eingestellt (Falling In Love Again) - Marlene Deitrich cover, from "Dead City Radio" - 1988
William
S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
William
S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
Sobrevivió
a todo: a Jack Kerouac y Allen Ginsberg, a sus propios excesos de
todo tipo, a la culpa, a los exilios, a los críticos. El sábado lo
mató su corazón, a los 83, en Kansas City.
Aunque
las informaciones cablegráficas repitan que murió el sábado, a los
83 años, en un cuarto de hospital de Lawrence (Kansas), los lectores
de William S. Burroughs harán bien en desconfiar. Beatnik
heterodoxo, perverso polimorfo, gourmet entusiasta de todas las
estimulaciones del mundo, el escritor sobrevivió a demasiadas
catástrofes como para que un módico ataque cardíaco obligue a
escribir sobre él en pasado.
Burroughs sobrevivió a una extensa carrera de heroinómano, emprendida intencionalmente a principios de los años '40, cuando dejó su St. Louis natal y desembarcó en Nueva York, y sólo interrumpida 20 años más tarde, en una diminuta habitación de Tánger cuando, después de pasarse un mes contemplándose su propio pie, descubrió, también intencionalmente, que se estaba muriendo. Sobrevivió a una fugaz experiencia criminal en México, cuando puso en práctica su alucinada puntería de Guillermo Tell con su mujer, Joan Vollmer Adams, y la mató con el disparo destinado al vaso de vidrio que había puesto sobre su cabeza. Sobrevivió a la culpa, al exilio (Sudamérica, Tánger) y a los procesos judiciales que le deparó a fines de los '50 su novela más famosa, Almuerzo desnudo, el más eufórico descenso a los infiernos de la droga que la
Sobrevivió a la admirada envidia que le profesaron Jack Kerouac y Allen Ginsberg, los dos cómplices con los que fundó el movimiento beatnik. Sobrevivió a la policía, a los médicos, al anonimato y a la fama, y hasta sobrevivió a Kurt Cobain, que en 1992 lo convocó para grabar su voz mitológica en un tema del álbum The Priest They Called Him. Ironías de la literatura: en 1993, Christopher Silvester, profético editor de una antología de reportajes, concluye el prólogo a la entrevista de Burroughs dándolo por muerto... en 1996.
Esa extraordinaria voluntad de persistencia es apenas la cara visible de la energía que consumió la vida y la obra de Burroughs: la energía de experimentar. Con su propio cuerpo, con la literatura, con la tecnología (no en vano Burroughs, ese Marshall Macluhan políticamente incorrecto, era nieto del inventor de la máquina de calcular), con las formas monstruosas que empieza a asumir el mundo contemporáneo. Ya en sus primeros libros (Yonqui y Queer, de principios de los años '50) aparece trazada la prodigiosa continuidad entre experiencia y ficción que marcaría toda su carrera. En 1959 publicó Almuerzo desnudo, la perfecta autobiografía de un heroinómano: libro radical, una biblia atroz que expande límites sin pudor y sin la menor sombra de autocompasión. Los temas: droga y sexualidad, la aleación que lo cubriría de escarnio y de prestigio. Las formas: una escritura salvaje, de una nitidez casi clínica, experta en el montaje de géneros, materiales y texturas que la literatura pocas veces se había atrevido a hacer coexistir. Este gran libro de drogón es también un gran libro de vidente que anuncia el mundo del porvenir. Un paisaje de paranoia y control planetarios.
Con Almuerzo desnudo nació el mito Burroughs. El resto de su obra es vasto, intrincado, a menudo ilegible. Libros como La máquina blanda, El boleto que explotó (próximo a aparecer en castellano) o Expreso Nova son nuevos atajos de un camino sin retorno, solitario y encarnizado, donde la experiencia estalla en jirones casi irreconocibles. La herencia Burroughs, sin embargo, no es libresca. Leída o no, conocida o rozada de segunda mano, su prosa y su figura fermentan desde hace décadas en los márgenes del mundo literario: en el rock (Patti Smith, Lou Reed, Soft Machine y David Bowie son algunos de sus deudores reconocidos, esto sin mencionar que U2 lo homenajea en su último video "Last nigth on heart"), en el cine (la versión Cronenberg de Almuerzo desnudo, el gurú adicto que Burroughs interpreta en Drugstore Cowboy, de Gus Van Sant), en todas aquellas regiones de la experiencia donde la vida busca transformarse en otra cosa.
William
S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
William S. BURROUGHS
es una de las figuras más transgresoras e inclasificables de la
literatura universal, hasta el punto de resultar dudosa su condición de
narrador, en el sentido estricto del término (contador de historias). No
cabe duda de que se trata de un escritor, puesto que su medio de
expresión es el lenguaje escrito plasmado sobre papel, pero ahí acaban
las certezas. El
lenguaje que utiliza está tan alejado de la norma académica como de las
distintas jergas y dialectos marginales norteamericanos. Con frecuencia
sazona su prosa con términos de invención propia, construcciones
gramaticales imposibles o palabras desprovistas de significado pero
cargadas de sonoridad. Por todo ello, puede considerarse la mayor parte
de su obra como poesía en prosa, ya que su intención no está tanto en la
narración como en la evocación de determinadas atmósferas y ambientes,
así como estados psicológicos extremos (casi nunca sentimientos). Para
este fin utiliza el lenguaje, destruyéndolo y recomponiéndolo a su
gusto, siempre consciente de que se trata de un código rígido y obtuso
que debe ser dinamitado y reprogramado, intentando utilizarlo como fin
más que como medio de expresión, ya que esto último supondría dejarlo en
el lugar que siempre ha ocupado y que le ha servido para llegar a un
estado de momificación absoluta. En este sentido, BURROUGHS, como Joyce ,
decide replantearse la base misma de la creación literaria, que no es
otra que el propio código de comunicación. Es consciente de que un nuevo
código transmite siempre nuevas ideas, y lo que es más importante:
nuevas sensaciones. Para él, escribir es un acto físico de coordinación
motora. Su meta es escribir más rápido de lo que se piensa, tal y como
lo pretendieron los surrealistas por medio de la escritura automática.
Este fin, aunque imposible, se vuelve deseable y útil como método de
creación, o incluso de meditación. De la misma forma que la repetición
de los “mantras” en el budismo zen es una forma de desproveer al
lenguaje de su significado y limpiar la mente de todo pensamiento,
ayudada por el ritmo respiratorio que dichos “mantras” imprimen al
cuerpo; la escritura automática es una forma de liberarse de esa
corriente de parloteo interno, encerrando los pensamientos en una hoja
de papel en blanco y dejándolos fluír sin reflexionar sobre ellos. Es el
monólogo interior de John Dos Passos llevado a su última consecuencia. Esta forma de trabajo fue una de las principales aportaciones que BURROUGHS transmitió a los escritores de la generación BEAT ,
de la que fue maestro y antecesor directo. No resulta casual que muchos
de sus integrantes mostraran interés por la meditación y las
tradiciones místicas orientales (zen, taoísmo, vedanta, sufismo...)y
desarrollaran un estilo hipnótico y sincopado muy influenciado por estas
filosofías, así como por movimientos musicales como el jazz y el
be-bop. Tanto Allen Ginsberg como Gregory Corso y, sobretodo Jack Kerouac ,
reflejan en sus páginas esta clase de flujo obsesivo y automático de
palabras, que guarda mucha relación con el beat (golpe) que les sirvió
de seña de identidad generacional. Golpes a las teclas de la máquina de
escribir, golpes a la batería de jazz que confieren un ritmo diabólico y
espiral a las improvisaciones, golpes de las máquinas que trabajan en
lugar del hombre a partir del fin de la Segunda Guerra Mundial y
sobretodo, golpes que les da la vida y la sociedad a todos aquellos que
pretenden guiarse por su conciencia individual más que por la luz que
irradia la locomotora del stablishment. Como hemos dicho, BURROUGHS
será una influencia decisiva sobre la generación beat, hasta el punto
de ser considerado en ocasiones como parte integrante de la misma (algo
no del todo cierto). El peculiar tratamiento que BURROUGHS hace del lenguaje lo llevará a la invención del método CUT-UP
(cortar y pegar) aplicado a la narrativa, consistente en recortar un
texto en múltiples fragmentos, agitarlos hasta mezclarlos aleatoriamente
y, finalmente recombinarlos tal y como vayan surgiendo de los
inexorables designios del azar. Dicho método ha dado lugar a novelas
enteras de William Burroughs, quien lo ha llegado a
utilizar durante entrevistas periodísticas por medio de la combinación
de tres o más cintas magnetofónicas grabadas con distintos discursos
mezlados de forma inconexa. Este
tipo de investigaciones y experimentos formales han cobrado gran
importancia en la evolución de la música electrónica y las artes
audiovisuales desde los sesenta hasta nuestros días (desde Stockhausen
hasta el sampler digital tan utilizado en la actualidad, pasando por
los videojockeys), pero no han seguido utilizándose apenas en la
literatura. Esto explica por qué Burroughs ha ejercido tanta influencia
sobre músicos y cineastas, tal como lo atestiguan los diversos
discos-homenaje publicados por el sello belga de electrónica
experimental Sub Rosa, o las múltiples colaboraciones de Burroughs con
músicos ( Kurt Cobain , Ministry , U2, Laurie Anderson ...) o cineastas
como Gus Van Sant y David Cronemberg .
William
Seward Burroughs
había nacido en el año 1914 en St. Louis (estado de Missouri) y desde
muy joven se había ido formando gracias a su condición de rata de
biblioteca y su esmerada educación burguesa (pertenece a una familia
acomodada, su abuelo fue el fundador de una famosa marca de
calculadoras, posteriormente absorbida por IBM). Estas circunstancias
biográficas lo llevan a un rechazo tajante de las convenciones sociales y
la moral imperante, que tan bien pudo conocer gracias a su entorno
familiar conservador. Fue criado en el “american way of life” propio de
la Norteamérica de entreguerras. Como suele suceder, las disidencias se
gestan en el centro mismo del problema. En este sentido, BURROUGHS
pertenece a una larga estirpe de burgueses automarginados y
transgresores, donde se encuentran también el Marqués de Sade , Cocteau
o Tomas De Quincey . Cuando uno no necesita preocuparse por subsistir
puede dedicar su tiempo a replantearse conceptos morales. Durante
su juventud, estudia en distintas universidades, licenciándose en
literatura inglesa en Harvard (donde conoce a T.S. Eliot )
en 1936 y cursando varios años de antropología, medicina, psicología...
en diversos países (Alemania, Panamá, México...). Se casa con una judía
alemana para librarla de los nazis y emprende un viaje por toda Europa.
Trabaja de redactor de un periódico en St. Louis y a partir de 1938 se
traslada a Chicago, donde ejercerá de exterminador de cucarachas y
asistirá a un seminario de semántica impartido por Alfred Korzibsky .
Se forma en profundidad en teoría psicoanalítica, parapsicología,
telepatía... leyendo compulsivamente a autores contemporáneos como
Wilhelm Reich , C.G. Jung , Spengler o L. Ron Hubbard y a clásicos
como Zoroastro , Giordano Bruno , Paracelso ... Junto
a su interés por el mundo de la ciencia y el ocultismo, desarrolla una
gran pasión por las armas, adquirida en la adolescencia durante su
estancia en el Ranch School, un internado aristocrático situado en Los
Álamos (Nuevo Méjico), donde poco tiempo después se realizarían las
primeras pruebas atómicas y donde el joven BURROUGHS se iniciaría en las prácticas homosexuales, a la edad de 15 años. Durante
su estancia en Chicago desde 1938 hasta 1943 se introduce en el mundo
del hampa y la delincuencia, condicionado por su incipiente adicción a
la morfina. En 1943 se instala en Nueva York, conoce a Herbert Huncke ,
uno de los “héroes” suburbanos retratados por los escritores de la
generación beat y heroinómano prototípico (así como genial escritor).
También en esa época conoce a Allen Ginsberg y Jack Kerouac, quienes
quedan fascinados por la amplia cultura y erudición de BURROUGHS,
tomándolo como maestro y fuente de inspiración para sus respectivas
obras literarias (en el caso concreto de Kerouac, en casi todas sus
novelas aparece algún personaje basado en BURROUGHS, como el Bull Lee de
“On the road”). El rol que desempeña BURROUGHS
en ese momento fundacional de la “beat generation” será el de “hermano
mayor” (aunque sea poco mayor que el resto), sobretodo gracias a haber
vivido en diversos países y poseer una vasta cultura de los más variados
temas. De este modo, BURROUGHS supera la sensación de
aislamiento y malditismo que le había perseguido desde la infancia.
Gracias a su influencia, Ginsberg y Kerouac leerán a autores como Hart
Crane , William Butler Yeats , W.H. Auden , Blake , Kafka , Denton Welch
... y comenzarán a interesarse por la cultura oriental, por medio de
obras clásicas como el Bhagavad- Gita , El Libro tibetano de los muertos
, Upanisad o el Tao Te King . A
principios de los cincuenta, Kerouac le insta a retomar su afición
infantil a escribir novelas. Incluso escribirán juntos una novela
inédita titulada “Y los hipopótamos se cocieron en sus tanques”, que
trataba de las experiencias homosexuales de un amigo común fallecido
prematuramente.Hay
que decir que BURROUGHS
había escrito algunas novelas en su infancia, como “La autobiografía de
un lobo”, con tan sólo ocho años o “Carl Cranbury en Egipto”. En ambas
se vislumbra su afición a los países exóticos como medio de alejarse del
aislamiento social al que su familia lo somete tras la caída de la
bolsa en 1929, hecho que provocó la ruina económica de su padre y la
consiguiente vergüenza y sensación de fracaso que lleva a su familia a
trasladarse a una pequeña propiedad en las afueras de St. Louis. En 1929
publica en la revista del colegio una historia titulada “Magnetismo
personal” en la que aborda precozmente varias de sus obsesiones
posteriores: control mental, telepatía... En torno a los diez años
escribe compulsivamente historias de piratas, vaqueros, gángsters...
sazonadas con abundantes duelos de pistola (un motivo repetido en varias
de sus novelas adultas). En estas primeras novelas se deja sentir la
influencia de un libro titulado “No puedes ganar”, autobiografía de un
ladrón llamado Jack Black publicada en 1924, obra que ejercerá un enorme
poder de fascinación sobre el joven BURROUGHS y que lo acercará a un
mundo marginal y furtivo que años después conocería de primera mano.
PRECEDIENDO AL “BEAT”: SU PRIMERA NOVELA
En
el año 1945, a pesar de su homosexualidad, se casa con una mujer
llamada Joan
y compra una granja en Texas. Dos años después se traslada a Nueva
Orleáns, donde comienza a tener problemas con la policía, ya que la
situación legal es cada vez más difícil para los morfinómanos, por lo
que huye a Méjico en 1949, donde asiste a un curso sobre historia azteca
y escribe sus dos primeras novelas: “Yonqui” y “Marica”. La primera de
ellas saldrá publicada en EEUU en 1953, gracias a las incansables
gestiones y correcciones de Allen Ginsberg. No olvidemos que este fue un
libro muy incómodo para el mundo editorial estadounidense de principios
de los cincuenta, tanto por su temática como por su estilo. Por esta
razón sale en un formato “pulp” y firmado con el pseudónimo William Lee ,
dentro de la editorial Ace Books de Carl Solomon , quien obliga a
BURROUGHS a escribir una nota introductoria con tono moralista para
cubrirse las espaldas ante la moral bienpensante de la época.En
su debut como escritor, BURROUGHS
utiliza un estilo mucho más conciso y aséptico que en la mayor parte de
sus obras posteriores. Otorga prioridad a la historia más que a la
forma literaria, construyendo una narración desprovista de todo elemento
accesorio, casi minimal. Este estilo, propio de las novelas “pulp”,
busca impactar por medio de la inmediatez del lenguaje y la contundencia
de lo que se cuenta. El lector asiste a una narración en primera
persona, de aspecto improvisado, lo cual otorga un aura de autenticidad a
la novela, que sirve como gancho para el lector (el morbo es un
elemento central en la intencionalidad de las “pulp novels”, a menudo
deudoras del periodismo sensacionalista). La novela se convierte
rápidamente en un hito dentro del subgénero de la autobiografía
toxicómana, destacando por su tono anti-poético y marginal,
distanciándose del romanticismo de De Quincey y del lirismo de “Cain's
book”, escrito por Trochi algunos años después. A diferencia de dichas
obras, el relato de BURROUGHS sólo se centra en el proceso adictivo
mismo, obviando cualquier narración adyacente con entidad propia y tono
evocador. Cuando
se publica esta primera novela, la sociedad estadounidense vive un
fervor prohibicionista en torno a diversas drogas, gracias en parte a la
política impulsada por Henry Anslinger desde la DEA ("drug
and food administration"). El estereotipo del adicto a narcóticos
cambia al tiempo que lo hacen las leyes sobre la venta de drogas,
pasando del modelo integrado social y económicamente propio del s.XIX y
principios del XX (representado por Coleridge o De Quincey
en la literatura) al marginal perseguido, residente de los barrios
pobres de las grandes urbes. El recrudecimiento de las leyes contra la
venta de drogas provocará la aparición de la figura del “camello” o
traficante clandestino, que a menudo vende sustancias adulteradas. Este momento de cambio en los hábitos y en la sociología de las drogas, se ve reflejado en la novela de BURROUGHS,
quien empieza su adicción durante la 2ª Guerra Mundial a base de
morfina y opiáceos de farmacia y progresivamente comienza a recurrir a
heroína adulterada del mercado callejero, con un precio
considerablemente mayor. La novela retrata la cotidianidad del adicto y
la lucha constante contra las resistencias de los médicos y
farmacéuticos a dispensar narcóticos (algo impensable tan sólo veinte
años antes, cuando estos mismos profesionales eran el principal grupo
social de adictos y/o difusores de la adicción yatrogénica). Diversos
historiadores de las sustancias psicoactivas ( Antonio Escohotado , Richard Rudgley, Sadie Plant ...)
han destacado la influencia determinante de esta novela de Burroughs en
la aparición del concepto de yonqui como estereotipo sociológico, muy
diferenciado del adicto a opiáceos de siglos anteriores (tanto del
morfinómano sanitario como del fumador de opio), cuyo ocaso queda
reflejado en la novela autobiográfica “Diary of a drug fiend” (1922) de Aleister Crowley . Cuando
en la década de los setenta los sueños de los “hijos de las flores” se
desvanecieron, la figura del yonqui marginal comenzó a tomar impulso en
forma de las llamadas “epidemias de heroína” (en España no llegará hasta
principios de los ochenta) y se reflejó notoriamente en varios
fenómenos de la cultura popular norteamericana. Desde las primeras
canciones de la Velvet Underground ( Heroin
a la cabeza) hasta el desencanto punk, pasando por la progresiva
marginalización y despolitización del movimiento underground o los
filmes de Warhol , Morrisey , Anger ... todos ellos influidos de forma
directa y confesa por BURROUGHS, una de las pocas figuras que resultó
inmune a la iconografía del “flower power” y al movimiento hippie. Ya
en esta primera novela, escrita en torno a 1950, deja claro su falta de
confianza en las ideologías políticas y en los movimientos de masas,
decantándose por la descripción de su universo personal más desgarrado y
sincero y consolidándose como el gran “outsider” de la literatura
norteamericana del siglo XX. Poco después de terminar “Yonqui”, BURROUGHS
escribe “Marica”, utilizando el mismo estilo simple y conciso. Esta
será su novela más sentimental, ya que trata de sus diversas relaciones
amorosas y sexuales durante su estancia en Méjico y Panamá. En ella
queda claro que su matrimonio con Joan, a pesar de los hijos en común,
es más una cuestión de amistad que de amor, ya que su condición de
homosexual lo lleva a acumular jóvenes amantes masculinos, a menudo
interesados por el dinero que esperan sacarle al “gringo”.
EL NACIMIENTO DEL MUTANTE Y SU ALMUERZO DESNUDO
En
Méjico, cuando cree haber encontrado por fin su asentamiento ideal (le
fascina la extrema libertad y el mundo onírico que se vive allí, amén de
la facilidad con que puede comprar morfina) sucede un accidente que
marcará su destino como escritor: su mujer muere tras recibir un disparo
del propio Burroughs mientras realizaban prácticas de tiro a lo
Guillermo Tell en estado ebrio. Este trágico suceso lo llevará a
embarcarse en una expedición antropológica a Panamá, que después
continuará en solitario por Colombia, Ecuador y Perú, en busca de la
ayahuasca o yagé , un poderoso enteógeno vegetal utilizado por diversas
tribus latinoamericanas (en especial por los jíbaros o shuar ).
El interés de Burroughs en esta sustancia procede de las alusiones que
muchos antropólogos habían hecho a sus supuestas propiedades telepáticas
(de hecho, uno de sus principios activos fue bautizado como
telepatina). Durante
estos viajes mantiene una relación epistolar con Allen Ginsberg. Las
cartas de ambos se recopilarán y saldrán publicadas con el título de
“Las cartas del yagé” en 1963. En ellas se observa la profunda depresión
que atraviesa BURROUGHS tras el desgraciado accidente con su esposa. Regresa
a Nueva York en 1953 para asistir como padrino al nacimiento incipiente
de la “Beat generation”. Conoce a Gregory Corso , John Clellon Holmes y
el resto de escritores beat. En 1954 se marcha a vivir a Tánger a causa
de sus problemas con la justicia estadounidense, allí residirá hasta
1958. Estos años serán los más duros y dramáticos de su vida, a causa de
su adicción cada vez mayor a la heroína. Sus vecinos se refieren a él
como “el hombre invisible” a causa de su aspecto extremadamente
degradado. Durante este período no es capaz de escribir más que pequeños
fragmentos inconexos , algunos de ellos incorporados después a su
novela “El almuerzo desnudo”, que describe su vida en esta época. Tras
numerosos intentos de desintoxicación, en 1956 se somete al
revolucionario tratamiento de apomorfina del doctor John Dent
(1888-1962) en una clínica de Londres, con resultados positivos que le
permitirán retomar enérgicamente su labor literaria. De hecho, a
principios de 1957 ya casi ha finalizado la novela, que será
mecanografiada por Kerouac durante una visita que le hacen él y Ginsberg
a Tánger. En 1958 se traslada a París, donde reside en el “hotel beat”,
llamado así por albergar a gran cantidad de escritores y pintores de
vanguardia a finales de los cincuenta, y comienza a experimentar con
métodos como el “cut-up” (cortado), el “fold-in” (montaje) o el
“splice-in” (inserción), aplicados a la literatura y surgidos de la
influencia decisiva del pintor Brion Gysin .“El almuerzo desnudo” es considerada por muchos como la obra maestra de BURROUGHS
y como una novela paradigmática en la historia de la literatura
norteamericana y mundial. Publicada tras muchos problemas legales en
1959, generó un auténtico escándalo en el mundo editorial estadounidense
y tuvo que afrontar diversos procesos legales por obscenidad en Los
Ángeles y Boston en 1965. La novela comienza con un prólogo-ensayo en el
que BURROUGHS reflexiona sobre la adicción a los
opiáceos como enfermedad metabólica, los distintos métodos de
desintoxicación y las abismales diferencias que existen entre las
diversas sustancias ilegales, cada una de ellas con unas características
históricas y farmacológicas distintas, aunque metidas en el mismo saco
de represión y ausencia de libertades por el gigante estadounidense,
quien exportó su criterio moralizante y prohibicionista a países con
larga tradición de consumo de sustancias ajenas al país del tío Sam, por
medio de coacciones y presiones económicas casi siempre motivadas por
oscuros intereses de estado. Tras
el prólogo, la novela profundiza en un universo onírico, obsesivo,
donde la alucinación se entremezcla con la realidad (es probable que el
frecuente consumo de mayún, una forma de hachís comestible, influyera
notablemente en la construcción de la atmósfera del libro). Las calles
de Tánger, Chicago o Nueva York se describen con intensidad
psicoanalítica por medio de contundentes imágenes monstruosas asociadas
casi siempre a los personajes “freaks” que pululan por ellas. La lucha
entre el poder y los desarraigados se expresa de forma hiperbólica por
medio de la sensación de constante paranoia que atraviesa la novela
desde su contundente comienzo:“Siento
que la pasma se me echa encima, los siento tomar posiciones ahí fuera,
organizar a sus soplones del demonio, canturreando en torno a la cuchara
y el cuentagotas que tiré en la estación de Washington Square”.El
autor utiliza la escritura automática y el constante monólogo interior
para lanzar imágenes vertiginosas sobre el papel, que impactan con la
fuerza de sus connotaciones más que por su significado literal:“Así que vuelvo al centro por la estación de Sheridan Square por si el secreta acecha en un armario de escobas. Ya
dije que no podía durar. Sabía que andaban por allí fuera en aquelarre,
preparando su magia negra pasmosa, pinchando muñecos con mi cara en
Leavenworth. ”A ese no sirve de nada clavarle agujas, Mike”.La
novela carece de planteamiento, nudo o desenlace y se desarrolla en
espiral a través de un torrente de sensaciones que impactan directamente
en el subconsciente del lector y se graban a fuego. El propio autor lo
explica de la siguiente manera:“No
pretendo imponer relato, argumento, continuidad... En la medida en que
consigo un registro DIRECTO de ciertas áreas del proceso psíquico, quizá
desempeñe una función concreta... no pretendo entretener”En
cuanto a la ambientación, también carece de escenario fijo. En un
párrafo te encuentras en Méjico y en otro en Nueva York, sin que medie
transición alguna. Este recurso permite al autor abordar una gran
cantidad de ambientes y sensaciones distintas, cuyo único elemento común
es el origen, la procedencia (la propia vida de BURROUGHS). De
esta forma, la no-historia que cuenta la novela es la no-historia de la
vida del autor en esos años, narrada con toda la intensidad de quién la
ha sentido en carne propia y se niega a filtrarla a través de ningún
género o convención literaria. Por ello, muchos párrafos de la novela
son pequeños ensayos microscópicos en los que no se describe ni se narra
sino que se teoriza. Ensayo y novela se juntan para dar lugar a poesía
en prosa, donde el lenguaje se subvierte y escapa a las convenciones. Leyendo “El almuerzo desnudo” se comprende la fascinación de BURROUGHS
por el método “cut-up”, aunque no lo haya utilizado aun en esta novela.
Resulta lógica su utilización por parte de un autor que siempre ha
priorizado la sugestión por encima de la narración (lo único que rompe
el “cut-up” es la narración, pero a menudo incrementa la sugestión). En
ocasiones se ha considerado “El almuerzo desnudo” como una novela
excesivamente densa e incoherente y es cierto que para el lector que
desconozca por completo la biografía del autor o que no se haya iniciado
con obras más accesibles como Yonqui o Marica, puede resultar
insufrible (por incomprensible). La historia que subyace tras el marasmo
onírico de la novela es la misma (o muy similar) que la narrada de
forma más clara en las dos novelas antes mencionadas. Son distintas
caras de la misma moneda. Las tres novelas se corresponden con el
período 1945-1953, los años de más intensa adicción de BURROUGHS.
El almuerzo desnudo expresa las sensaciones intangibles que acompañaron
a los hechos concretos narrados en las otras dos obras, por lo que lo
más adecuado puede ser leerla en último lugar, cuando ya se poseen unas
coordenadas espacio-temporales, dadas en las obras precedentes. De todas
formas, es necesario que el lector se abandone a la sugestión y aborde
la novela como si de poesía se tratase, sin pretender encontrar un hilo
argumental (lo mismo que ocurre con las películas de David Lynch o Philippe Garrel ).
DE LOS SESENTA A LOS NOVENTA, O EL TRIUNFO DEL CUT-UP
Tras
su novela-hito, el profesor chiflado de la literatura abraza
definitivamente las nuevas concepciones formales que surgieron del
magnetismo creativo de Brion Gysin y posteriormente
fueron elaboradas y regurgitadas por el escritor de St. Louis, quien las
bautizó con los nombres ya mencionados ( cut-up , fold-in , splice-in y algunos más). En
1960 se traslada a Londres, aunque con esporádicas estancias en París y
Tánger. Desde allí vive distanciado del enorme revuelo que su novela
“El almuerzo desnudo” está provocando en EEUU. En Edimburgo asiste a una
Conferencia Internacional de escritores, donde autores como Norman Mailer le expresan una enorme admiración por su novela. En
1965 reside en el mítico Hotel Chelsea de Nueva York, con diversos
músicos y artistas de la nueva generación hippie, conoce a Andy Warhol ,
Larry Ryvers, Basquiat
y otros muchos representantes de la pintura y poesía de la década de
los sesenta. Poco después regresa a Londres, donde residirá hasta 1974,
fecha de su definitivo regreso a EEUU.Desde
la publicación de “El almuerzo desnudo”, BURROUGHS
comienza un proceso rápido de radicalización estilística, más acorde
con su filosofía vital que el estilo pulp de sus primeras novelas.
Comienza a aplicar trucos y prestidigitaciones lingüísticas con el
objetivo de romper aun más la forma de sus novelas (una de sus
sentencias más famosas es la contundente: “language is a virus”).
Paralelamente, se vislumbra en sus nuevas obras un leve rastro
ideológico, antes completamente inexistente. Comienzan a aparecer
continuas referencias al PODER y a la anulación del hombre a través del
CONTROL . El universo INTERZONA
ha resultado fatalmente profético, un mundo globalizado donde “hablar
es mentir y vivir es colaborar”, un mundo acelerado donde no queda
tiempo para vivir y mucho menos para pensar. El planeta Nova, presente
de forma recurrente en su trilogía “La máquina blanda” (1961), ”El
tiquet que explotó” (1962) y “Expreso Nova” (1964), es una inmensa
metáfora de la paranoia cibernética (recordemos la pleitesía que
rindieron a BURROUGHS los exponentes de la corriente cyberpunk , léase
William Gibson , Bruce Stirling y Clive Barker ). Un universo que en
ocasiones posee reminiscencias de “El Proceso” de Kafka ,
pero desde una perspectiva más extrema y tecnológica. En el universo
NOVA, las fuerzas policiales acechan en cada esquina y el individuo no
está permitido.“Las
armas más poderosas han sido siempre las nuevas formas de conciencia...
la Inquisición y el poder de la Iglesia en la Edad Media no fueron
derribadas por una acción revolucionaria directa. Su fuerza desapareció
porque la conciencia humana se desarrolló más allá de ellos”.Los
habitantes grises de Nova parecen vivir en un universo pregrabado donde
la única salida está en provocar un fallo del sistema. En una sociedad
binaria, dominada por el conflicto de opuestos, la unidad es
revolucionaria:“Hay
varias fórmulas básicas que han mantenido a este planeta en la
ignorancia y la esclavitud. La primera es el concepto de nación o país.
Se dibuja una línea alrededor de un territorio y se le llama país. Lo
que significa que hay que poner policía, control de aduanas, fronteras,
ejércitos, y también problemas con las otras tribus del otro lado de la
línea”El
chico subliminal ,
uno de los fantasmales habitantes de Nova, se desplaza por un mundo
corrupto donde las fuerzas del orden son los criminales más peligrosos.
Esta atmósfera inquietante se adelanta en más de una década a la
paranoia post-hippie de los “speed-freaks” y los “hell-angels”, la caída
del sueño psicodélico de retorno a la naturaleza, representado
gráficamente por el dibujante de cómics Robert Crumb , quien describe la
década de los sesenta como una gigantesca ola que acaba estrellándose
contra las rocas del PODER
y deja a su paso un rastro de destrucción (“he visto las mejores mentes
de mi generación destruídas por la locura”, el impactante aullido de
Allen Ginsberg resultó premonitorio para lo que ocurriría en los
setenta).Uno
de los méritos de William S. BURROUGHS
ha sido su capacidad de sobrevolar todas las modas y tendencias sin
influirse más que por su arrolladora personalidad. Un auténtico “lobo
estepario” de la era cibernética que fue capaz de publicar decenas de
libros en la década de los sesenta sin acercarse por un momento a las
modas de la época. La obra de BURROUGHS sigue resultando igual de
atípica y visionaria en el 2004 de lo que lo fue en 1959 (lo mismo que
ocurre con personajes como Timoty Leary , John Lily o James Lovelock
en ciencia y filosofía o John Cage , Nico o Laurie Anderson en
música). La
trilogía NOVA, leída hoy en día resulta absolutamente esclarecedora:
“las técnicas esenciales de NOVA son muy simples, consisten en crear y
agrabar conflictos”. Además
de la referida trilogía, BURROUGHS
aprovecha la década prodigiosa para publicar infinidad de artículos
teóricos y relatos en las más variopintas publicaciones
contraculturales, así como algún que otro montaje teatral o poemas
sueltos, como su aportación a la compilación poética “Minutes to go”,
junto a Gregory Corso y Sinclair Belles . Igualmente, ofrece numerosas
conferencias donde aborda los más variados temas (política, drogas,
literatura...) A
principios de los setenta vive una crisis creativa en Londres, ya que
lleva décadas escribiendo y sus obras casi nunca han pasado del
malditismo más absoluto. Escribe el guión cinematográfico “Las últimas
palabras de Dulch Schulz” (1970), las novelas “Los muchachos salvajes”
(1971) y “Puerto de los santos” (1973), así como las compilaciones de
relatos “Exterminador” y “Metro blanco” (ambas en 1971), todas ellas
absolutos fracasos comerciales, como el resto de sus obras hasta su
muerte. A
mediados de los setenta y gracias, en parte a la ayuda de el bueno de
Ginsberg, comienza a ofrecer seminarios en diversas universidades
norteamericanas y europeas. Ya de vuelta en EEUU, publica de forma
compulsiva infinidad de obras a finales de los setenta, entre ellas
destacan “La tercera mente” (1978) junto a Brion Gysin
o “Doctor Benway” (1979) una suerte de remix o variación de “El
almuerzo desnudo”, protagonizada por uno de sus personajes más
enigmáticos. En
los ochenta publica una genial trilogía del espacio: “Ciudades de la
noche roja” (1981), “El lugar de los caminos muertos” (1984) y “Las
tierras de occidente” (1987). En ellas se dan citas los géneros más
marcianos, desde el western surreal-cibernético a la
ciencia ficción más reflexiva y ensayística. En estas obras el prolífico
escritor norteamericano retoma lo mejor de su estilo aplicándolo a un
nuevo tipo de historias, lo que le valió para trascender la compulsión
del cut-up y retornar a un estilo más simple:“Creo
que Finnegan`s Wake
ejemplifica muy bien la trampa en que puede caer la literatura
experimental cuando se convierte en puramente experimental. Yo he ido
así de lejos en algunos experimentos concretos y luego he retrocedido;
es decir, ahora vuelvo a escribir narrativa lineal puramente
convencional, pero aplicando lo que he aprendido con el cut-up y con
las otras técnicas a los problemas de la escritura convencional”Esa capacidad de reinventarse dice mucho a favor de la literatura de BURROUGHS
en los años ochenta, aunque lo que él denomina “escritura convencional”
no lo sea en absoluto, ni en la forma ni en el fondo. De hecho, muchos
de los hallazgos expresivos alcanzados por BURROUGHS
hace décadas aún no han sido asimilados ni incorporados apenas a la
literatura (a diferencia de lo que ocurre con la música o las artes
visuales, que llevan algún tiempo transitando por la senda
burroughsiana).Desde
finales de los ochenta hasta su muerte en 1997, Burroughs publicó una
enorme cantidad de novelas pero, sobretodo dedicó sus esfuerzos a la
pintura, la música y el cine, grabando infinidad de discos con gente
como David Bowie , Frank Zappa , Tom Waits , New Order , The Jesús &
Mary Chain , Henry Rollins , Blondie y un interminable etcétera. Sus
cuadros han sido utilizados como portadas de discos de Sonic Youth
y su presencia ha sido requerida hasta para el spot publicitario de una
multinacional de zapatillas deportivas. Ha protagonizado diversos
cortos y prestado sus guiones para otros tantos (muchos de ellos de la
animación más innovadora que se ha hecho en los noventa), así como
numerosas películas. En definitiva, al final de su vida, el escritor
maldito se convirtió en una especie de icono mediático de referencia
para los hijos del punk y la nueva escena electrónica experimental,
convirtiéndose en uno de los personajes con más presencia en la red
INTERNET (¿interzona?). Incluso diversas universidades y entidades lo
condecoraron con dudosos galardones en un vano intento por domesticar y
absorver su mensaje de transgresión. Afortunadamente, hoy en día, años
después de su muerte, sigue ocupando el mismo lugar inclasificable que
ocupó siempre, y el tiempo le seguirá dando la razón.
William S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
AcademiaEdu
Vásquez Rocca, Adolfo,“William S. Burroughs y Jacques Derrida; Literatura parasitaria y Cultura Replicante: Del virus del Lenguaje a la Psicotopografía del Texto”, En ERRANCIA, La palabra Inconclusa, Nº 9 - 2014
William S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
William S. Burroughs
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For other people named William Burroughs, see William Burroughs (disambiguation).
| William S. Burroughs | |
|---|---|
Burroughs
| |
| Born | William Seward Burroughs II February 5, 1914 St. Louis, Missouri, U.S. |
| Died | August 2, 1997 (aged 83) Lawrence, Kansas, U.S. |
| Pen name | William Lee |
| Occupation | Author |
| Alma mater | Harvard University |
| Genre | Satire, paranoid fiction |
| Literary movement | Beat Generation, Postmodernism |
| Notable works | Naked Lunch (1959) |
| Spouse | Ilse von Klapper (1937–1946) Joan Vollmer (1946–1951) |
| Children | William S. Burroughs, Jr. |
| Relatives | William Seward Burroughs I, grandfather Ivy Lee, maternal uncle |
 |
|---|
| William S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil |
|---|
| Signature |  |
|---|
He was born to a wealthy family in St. Louis, Missouri, grandson of the inventor and founder of the Burroughs Corporation, William Seward Burroughs I, and nephew of public relations manager Ivy Lee. Burroughs began writing essays and journals in early adolescence. He left home in 1932 to attend Harvard University, studied English, and anthropology as a postgraduate, and later attended medical school in Vienna. After being turned down by the Office of Strategic Services and U.S. Navy
in 1942 to serve in World War II, he picked up the drug addiction that
affected him for the rest of his life, while working a variety of jobs.
In 1943 while living in New York City, he befriended Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac, the mutually influential foundation of which grew into the Beat Generation, and later the 1960s counterculture.
Much of Burroughs's work is semi-autobiographical, primarily drawn from his experiences as a heroin addict, as he lived throughout Mexico City, London, Paris, Berlin, the South American Amazon and Tangier in Morocco. Burroughs accidentally killed his second wife, Joan Vollmer, in 1951 in Mexico City, and was consequently convicted of manslaughter. In the introduction to Queer,
a novel written in 1953 but not published until 1985, Burroughs states,
"I am forced to the appalling conclusion that I would have never become
a writer but for Joan’s death ... [S]o the death of Joan brought me
into contact with the invader, the Ugly Spirit, and maneuvered me into a
lifelong struggle, in which I had no choice except to write my way
out". (Queer, 1985, p.xxii). Finding success with his confessional first novel, Junkie (1953), Burroughs is perhaps best known for his third novel Naked Lunch (1959), a controversy-fraught work that underwent a court case under the U.S. sodomy laws. With Brion Gysin, he also popularized the literary cut-up technique in works such as The Nova Trilogy (1961–64).
In 1983, Burroughs was elected to the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, and in 1984 was awarded the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by France.[2] Jack Kerouac called Burroughs the "greatest satirical writer since Jonathan Swift",[3] a reputation he owes to his "lifelong subversion"[1] of the moral, political and economic systems of modern American society, articulated in often darkly humorous sardonicism. J. G. Ballard considered Burroughs to be "the most important writer to emerge since the Second World War", while Norman Mailer declared him "the only American writer who may be conceivably possessed by genius".[3]
Burroughs had one child, William Seward Burroughs III (1947–1981), with his second wife Joan Vollmer. He died at his home in Lawrence, Kansas, after suffering a heart attack in 1997.
Contents
Early life and education
William S. Burroughs birthday
Burroughs was born in 1914, the younger of two sons born to Mortimer
Perry Burroughs (June 16, 1885 – January 5, 1965) and Laura Hammon Lee
(August 5, 1888 – October 20, 1970). The Burroughses were a prominent
family of English ancestry in St. Louis, Missouri. His grandfather, William Seward Burroughs I, founded the Burroughs Adding Machine company, which evolved into the Burroughs Corporation. Burroughs' mother was the daughter of a minister whose family claimed to be related to Robert E. Lee. His maternal uncle, Ivy Lee,
was an advertising pioneer later employed as a publicist for the
Rockefellers. His father ran an antique and gift shop, Cobblestone
Gardens; first in St. Louis, then in Palm Beach, Florida.
As a boy, Burroughs lived on Pershing Ave. in St. Louis's Central West End. He attended John Burroughs School in St. Louis where his first published essay, "Personal Magnetism", was printed in the John Burroughs Review in 1929.[4] He then attended the Los Alamos Ranch School in New Mexico, which was stressful for him. The school was a boarding school for the wealthy, "where the spindly sons of the rich could be transformed into manly specimens".[5] Burroughs kept journals
documenting an erotic attachment to another boy. According to his own
account, he destroyed these later, ashamed of their content.[6]
Due to the repressive context where he grew up, and from which he fled,
that is, a "family where displays of affection were considered
embarrassing",[7]
he kept his sexual orientation concealed well into adulthood, when he
became a well known homosexual writer after the publication of Naked Lunch in 1959. Some[who?] say that he was expelled from Los Alamos after taking chloral hydrate in Santa Fe
with a fellow student. Yet, according to his own account, he left
voluntarily: "During the Easter vacation of my second year I persuaded
my family to let me stay in St. Louis."[6]
Harvard University
Burroughs finished high school at Taylor School in Clayton, Missouri, and in 1932, left home to pursue an arts degree at Harvard University, where he was affiliated with Adams House. During the summers, he worked as a cub reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch,
covering the police docket. He disliked the work, and refused to cover
some events, like the death of a drowned child. He lost his virginity in
an East St. Louis brothel that summer with a female prostitute he regularly patronized.[8] While at Harvard, Burroughs made trips to New York City and was introduced to the gay subculture there. He visited lesbian dives, piano bars, and the Harlem and Greenwich Village homosexual underground with Richard Stern, a wealthy friend from Kansas City.
They would drive from Boston to New York in a reckless fashion. Once,
Stern scared Burroughs so much, he asked to be let out of the vehicle.[9]
Burroughs graduated from Harvard in 1936. According to Ted Morgan's Literary Outlaw,
Burroughs's parents sold the rights to his grandfather's invention and had no share in the Burroughs Corporation. Shortly before the 1929 stock market crash, they sold their stock for $200,000 (equivalent to approximately $2,746,899 in today's funds[11]).[12]His parents, upon his graduation, had decided to give him a monthly allowance of $200 out of their earnings from Cobblestone Gardens, a tidy sum in those days. It was enough to keep him going, and indeed it guaranteed his survival for the next twenty-five years, arriving with welcome regularity. The allowance was a ticket to freedom; it allowed him to live where he wanted to and to forgo employment.[10]
Europe
After leaving Harvard, Burroughs's formal education ended, except for brief flirtations as a graduate student of anthropology at Harvard and as a medical student in Vienna, Austria. He traveled to Europe and became involved in Austrian and Hungarian Weimar-era LGBT culture;
he picked up young men in steam baths in Vienna, and moved in a circle
of exiles, homosexuals, and runaways. There, he met Ilse Klapper, a Jewish woman fleeing the country's Nazi government. The two were never romantically involved, but Burroughs married her, in Croatia,
against the wishes of his parents, to allow her to gain a visa to the
United States. She made her way to New York City, and eventually
divorced Burroughs, although they remained friends for many years.[13]
After returning to the U.S., he held a string of uninteresting jobs. In
1939, his mental health became a concern for his parents, especially
after he deliberately severed the last joint of his left little finger,
right at the knuckle, to impress a man with whom he was infatuated.[14] This event made its way into his early fiction as the short story "The Finger".
Beginning of the Beats
Burroughs enlisted in the U.S. Army early in 1942, shortly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor brought the U.S. into World War II.
But when he was classified as a 1-A Infantry, not an officer, he became
dejected. His mother recognized her son's depression and got Burroughs a
civilian disability discharge—a release from duty based on the premise
he should have not been allowed to enlist due to previous mental
instability. After being evaluated by a family friend, who was also a
neurologist at a psychiatric treatment center, Burroughs waited five
months in limbo at Jefferson Barracks outside St. Louis before being
discharged. During that time he met a Chicago soldier also awaiting
release, and once Burroughs was free, he moved to Chicago and held a
variety of jobs, including one as an exterminator. When two of his friends from St. Louis, Lucien Carr, a University of Chicago student, and David Kammerer, Carr's admirer, left for New York City, Burroughs followed.
Joan Vollmer
 |
This section does not cite any references or sources. (March 2011) |
In 1944, Burroughs began living with Joan Vollmer Adams in an apartment they shared with Jack Kerouac and Edie Parker, Kerouac's first wife.[15] Vollmer Adams was married to a GI
with whom she had a young daughter, Julie Adams. Burroughs and Kerouac
got into trouble with the law for failing to report a murder involving Lucien Carr,
who had killed David Kammerer in a confrontation over Kammerer's
incessant and unwanted advances. This incident inspired Burroughs and
Kerouac to collaborate on a novel titled And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks,
completed in 1945. The two fledgling authors were unable to get it
published, but the manuscript was eventually published in November 2008
by Grove Press and Penguin Books.
During this time, Burroughs began using morphine and became addicted. He eventually sold heroin in Greenwich Village to support his habit.
Vollmer also became an addict, but her drug of choice was Benzedrine, an amphetamine
sold over the counter at that time. Because of her addiction and social
circle, her husband immediately divorced her after returning from the
war. Vollmer would become Burroughs’ common-law wife.
Burroughs was soon arrested for forging a narcotics prescription and
was sentenced to return to his parents' care in St. Louis. Vollmer's
addiction led to a temporary psychosis which resulted in her admission
to a hospital, and the custody of her child was endangered. Yet after
Burroughs completed his house arrest in St. Louis, he returned to New
York, released Vollmer from the psychiatric ward of Bellevue Hospital, and moved with her and her daughter to Texas. Vollmer soon became pregnant with Burroughs's child. Their son, William S. Burroughs, Jr., was born in 1947. The family moved briefly to New Orleans in 1948.
Mexico and South America
Burroughs fled to Mexico to escape possible detention in Louisiana's Angola state prison.
Vollmer and their children followed him. Burroughs planned to stay in
Mexico for at least five years, the length of his charge's statute of limitations. Burroughs also attended classes at the Mexico City College in 1950 studying Spanish, as well as "Mexican picture writing" (codices) and the Mayan language with R. H. Barlow.
In 1951, Burroughs shot and killed Vollmer in a drunken game of "William Tell"
at a party above the American-owned Bounty Bar in Mexico City. He spent
13 days in jail before his brother came to Mexico City and bribed
Mexican lawyers and officials to release Burroughs on bail while he
awaited trial for the killing, which was ruled culpable homicide.[16]
Vollmer’s daughter, Julie Adams, went to live with her grandmother, and
William S. Burroughs, Jr., went to St. Louis to live with his
grandparents. Burroughs reported every Monday morning to the jail in
Mexico City while his prominent Mexican attorney worked to resolve the
case. According to James Grauerholz,
two witnesses had agreed to testify that the gun had gone off
accidentally while he was checking to see if it was loaded, and the
ballistics experts were bribed to support this story.[17] Nevertheless, the trial was continuously delayed and Burroughs began to write what would eventually become the short novel Queer
while awaiting his trial. However, when his attorney fled Mexico after
his own legal problems involving a car accident and altercation with the
son of a government official, Burroughs decided, according to Ted Morgan,
to "skip" and return to the United States. He was convicted in absentia
of homicide and was given a two-year sentence which was suspended.[18]
Although Burroughs was writing before the shooting of Joan Vollmer,
this event marked him and, biographers argue, his work for the rest of
his life.[19]
After leaving Mexico, Burroughs drifted through South America for several months, looking for a drug called yagé, which promised the user telepathy. A book composed of letters between Burroughs and Ginsberg, The Yage Letters, was published in 1963 by City Lights Books.
Beginning of literary career
Burroughs later said that shooting Vollmer was a pivotal event in his life, and one which provoked his writing:
I am forced to the appalling conclusion that I would never have become a writer but for Joan's death, and to a realization of the extent to which this event has motivated and formulated my writing. I live with the constant threat of possession, and a constant need to escape from possession, from control. So the death of Joan brought me in contact with the invader, the Ugly Spirit, and maneuvered me into a life long struggle, in which I have had no choice except to write my way out.[20]
Yet he had begun to write in 1945. Burroughs and Kerouac collaborated on And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks, a mystery novel loosely based on the Carr/Kammerer situation and that was left unpublished. Years later, in the documentary What Happened to Kerouac?,
Burroughs described it as "not a very distinguished work". An excerpt
of this work, in which Burroughs and Kerouac wrote alternating chapters,
was finally published in Word Virus,[21] a compendium of William Burroughs's writing that was published by his biographer after his death in 1997.
Before Vollmer died, Burroughs had largely completed his first two novels in Mexico, although Queer was not published until 1985. Junkie was written at the urging of Allen Ginsberg, who was instrumental in getting the work published, even as a cheap mass-market paperback.[22] Ace Books published the novel in 1953 as part of an Ace Double under the pen name William Lee, retitling it Junkie: Confessions of an Unredeemed Drug Addict (it was later republished as Junkie or Junky).[22]
Tangier
During 1953, Burroughs was at loose ends. Due to legal problems, he
was unable to live in the cities towards which he was most inclined. He
spent time with his parents in Palm Beach, Florida, and New York City with Allen Ginsberg. When Ginsberg refused his romantic advances,[23] Burroughs went to Rome to meet Alan Ansen on a vacation financed from his parents' continuing support. When he found Rome and Ansen’s company dreary, and inspired by Paul Bowles' fiction, he decided to head for Tangier, Morocco.[24]
In a home owned by a known procurer of homosexual prostitutes for
visiting American and English men, he rented a room and began to write a
large body of text that he personally referred to as Interzone.[25]
Burroughs lived in Tangier for several months before returning to the
United States where he suffered a combination of personal indignities
and financial problems. Allen Ginsberg was at the time in California and
refused to see him. A. A. Wyn, the publisher of Junkie, was not forthcoming with his royalties. Burroughs’ parents were threatening to cut off his allowance.[citation needed]
To Burroughs, all signs directed a return to Tangier, a city where
drugs were freely available and where financial support from his family
would continue. He realized that in the Moroccan culture he had found an
environment that synchronized with his temperament and afforded no
hindrances to pursuing his interests and indulging in his chosen
activities. In 1950, Robert Ruark had described the unbridled tenor of
the Moroccan city in his syndicated column. Compared to Tangier, Ruark
wrote, “Sodom was a church picnic and Gomorrah a convention of Girl
Scouts.” The misogyny of the social structure also appealed to
Burroughs’ innate distrust and fear of women. In Tangier, the
ubiquitously veiled and shrouded woman loudly broadcast the subservient
female role.[26]
He left for Tangier in November 1954 and spent the next four years there working on the fiction that would later become Naked Lunch, as well as attempting to write commercial articles about Tangier. He sent these writings to Ginsberg, his literary agent for Junkie, but none were published until 1989 when Interzone, a collection of short stories, was published. Under the strong influence of a marijuana confection known as majoun and a German-made opioid called Eukodol,
Burroughs settled in to write. Eventually, Ginsberg and Kerouac, who
had traveled to Tangier in 1957, helped Burroughs type, edit, and
arrange these episodes into Naked Lunch.[27]
Naked Lunch
Further information: Naked Lunch
Whereas Junkie and Queer were conventional in style, Naked Lunch was his first venture into a non-linear style. After the publication of Naked Lunch, a book whose creation was to a certain extent the result of a series of contingencies, Burroughs was exposed to Brion Gysin's cut-up technique at the Beat Hotel in Paris in September 1959. He began slicing up phrases and words to create new sentences.[28]
At the Beat Hotel Burroughs discovered "a port of entry" into Gysin's
canvases: "I don't think I had ever seen painting until I saw the
painting of Brion Gysin."[29]
The two would cultivate a long-term friendship that revolved around a
mutual interest in artworks and cut-up techniques. Scenes were slid
together with little care for narrative. Perhaps thinking of his crazed physician, Dr. Benway, he described Naked Lunch as a book that could be cut into at any point. Although not considered science fiction, the book does seem to forecast—with eerie prescience—such later phenomena as AIDS, liposuction, autoerotic fatalities, and the crack pandemic.[30]
David Woodard and Burroughs standing in front of a dreamachine invented by Brion Gysin; Burroughs collaborated with Gysin in popularizing the literary cut-up technique, with which he wrote The Soft Machine, The Ticket That Exploded, and Nova Express.
Excerpts from Naked Lunch were first published in the United States in 1958. The novel was initially rejected by City Lights Books, the publisher of Ginsberg's Howl; and Olympia Press publisher Maurice Girodias,
who had published English-language novels in France that were
controversial for their subjective views of sex and anti-social
characters. But Allen Ginsberg worked to get excerpts published in Black Mountain Review and Chicago Review in 1958. Irving Rosenthal, student editor of Chicago Review, a quarterly journal partially subsidized by the university, promised to publish more excerpts from Naked Lunch, but he was fired from his position in 1958 after Chicago Daily News columnist Jack Mabley called the first excerpt obscene. Rosenthal went on to publish more in his newly created literary journal Big Table No. 1;
however, these copies elicited such contempt, the editors were accused
of sending obscene material through the United States Mail by the United States Postmaster General,
who ruled that copies could not be mailed to subscribers. New York
critic John Ciardi did manage to get a copy and wrote a positive review
of the work, prompting a telegram from Allen Ginsberg praising the
review.[31] This controversy made Naked Lunch interesting to Girodias again, and he published the novel in 1959.[citation needed]
After the novel was published, it slowly became notorious across
Europe and the United States, garnering interest from not just members
of the counterculture of the 1960s, but also literary critics such as Mary McCarthy. Once published in the United States, Naked Lunch was prosecuted as obscene by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, followed by other states. In 1966, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
declared the work "not obscene" on the basis of criteria developed
largely to defend the book. The case against Burroughs's novel still
stands as the last obscenity trial against a work of literature—that is,
a work consisting of words only, and not including illustrations or
photographs—prosecuted in the United States.
The "Word Hoard", the collection of manuscripts that produced Naked Lunch, also produced the later works The Soft Machine (1961), The Ticket That Exploded (1962), and Nova Express
(1963). These novels feature extensive use of the cut-up technique
which influenced all of Burroughs' subsequent fiction to a degree.
During Burroughs' friendship and artistic collaborations with Brion
Gysin and Ian Sommerville,
the technique was combined with images, Gysin's paintings, and sound,
via Somerville's tape recorders. Burroughs was so dedicated to the
cut-up method that he often defended his use of the technique before
editors and publishers, most notably Dick Seaver at Grove Press in the 1960s[32] and Holt, Rinehart & Winston
in the 1980s. The cut-up method, because of its random or mechanical
basis for text generation, combined with the possibilities of mixing in
text written by other writers, deemphasizes the traditional role of the
writer as creator or originator of a string of words, while
simultaneously exalting the importance of the writer's sensibility as an
editor. In this sense, the cut-up method may be considered as analogous
to the collage method in the visual arts.
Paris and the "Beat Hotel"
Burroughs moved into a rundown hotel in the Latin Quarter of Paris in 1959 when Naked Lunch was still looking for a publisher. Tangier,
with its easy access to drugs, small groups of homosexuals, growing
political unrest, and odd collection of criminals, had become
increasingly unhealthy for Burroughs.[33] He went to Paris to meet Ginsberg and talk with Olympia Press. In so doing, he left a brewing legal problem, which eventually transferred itself to Paris. Paul Lund,
a British former career criminal and cigarette smuggler whom Burroughs
met in Tangier, was arrested on suspicion of importing narcotics into
France. Lund gave up Burroughs, and some evidence implicated Burroughs
in the possible importation of narcotics into France. Once again, the
man faced criminal charges, this time in Paris for conspiracy to import
opiates, when the Moroccan authorities forwarded their investigation to
French officials. Yet it was under this impending threat of criminal
sanction that Maurice Girodias published Naked Lunch; the
publication helped in getting Burroughs a suspended sentence, since a
literary career, according to Ted Morgan, is a respected profession in
France.
The "Beat Hotel" was a typical European-style rooming house
hotel, with common toilets on every floor, and a small place for
personal cooking in the room. Life there was documented by the
photographer Harold Chapman, who lived in the attic room. This shabby, inexpensive hotel was populated by Gregory Corso, Ginsberg and Peter Orlovsky for several months after Naked Lunch
first appeared. The actual process of publication was partly a function
of its "cut-up" presentation to the printer. Girodias had given
Burroughs only ten days to prepare the manuscript for print galleys, and
Burroughs sent over the manuscript in pieces, preparing the parts in no
particular order. When it was published in this authentically random
manner, Burroughs liked it better than the initial plan. International
rights to the work were sold soon after, and Burroughs used the $3,000
advance from Grove Press to buy drugs (equivalent to approximately $24,271 in today's funds[11]).[34] Naked Lunch was featured in a 1959 Life magazine cover story, partly as an article that highlighted the growing Beat literary movement.
During this time Burroughs found an outlet for material otherwise rendered unpublishable in Jeff Nuttall's My Own Mag.[citation needed]
The London years
Burroughs left Paris for London in 1966 to take the cure again with
Dr. Dent, a well-known English medical doctor who spearheaded a
reputedly painless heroin withdrawal treatment using the drug apomorphine.[35] Keith Richards and Anita Pallenberg would take this same cure in 1971, with Dr. Dent's nurse, Smitty.[36]
Dent's apomorphine cure was also used to treat alcoholism, although it
was held by several people who undertook it to be no more than
straightforward aversion therapy. Burroughs however was convinced.
Following his first cure, he wrote a detailed appreciation of
apomorphine and other cures, which he submitted to The British Journal of Addiction (Vol. 53, 1956) under the title "Letter From A Master Addict To Dangerous Drugs"; this letter is appended to many editions of Naked Lunch.
Though he ultimately relapsed, Burroughs ended up working out of
London for six years, traveling back to the United States on several
occasions, including one time escorting his son to the Lexington Narcotics Farm and Prison after the younger Burroughs had been convicted of prescription fraud in Florida. In the "Afterword" to the compilation of his son's two previously published novels Speed and Kentucky Ham,
Burroughs writes that he thought he had a "small habit" and left London
quickly without any narcotics because he suspected the U.S. customs
would search him very thoroughly on arrival. He claims he went through
the most excruciating two months of opiate withdrawal while seeing his
son through his trial and sentencing, traveling with Billy to Lexington, Kentucky from Miami to ensure his son entered the hospital he once spent time in as a volunteer admission.[37] Earlier Burroughs revisited St. Louis, Missouri, taking a large advance from Playboy to write an article about his trip back to St. Louis, one that was eventually published in The Paris Review, after Burroughs refused to alter the style for Playboy's publishers. In 1968 Burroughs joined Jean Genet, John Sack, and Terry Southern in covering the 1968 Democratic National Convention for Esquire
magazine. Southern and Burroughs, who had first become acquainted in
London, would remain lifelong friends and collaborators. In 1972,
Burroughs and Southern unsuccessfully attempted to adapt Naked Lunch for the screen in conjunction with American game-show producer Chuck Barris.[38]
Burroughs supported himself and his addiction by publishing pieces in
small literary presses. His avant-garde reputation grew internationally
as the hippie counterculture discovered his earlier works. He developed
a close friendship with Anthony Balch and lived with a young hustler
named John Brady who continuously brought home young women despite
Burroughs' protestations. In the midst of this personal turmoil,
Burroughs managed to complete two works: a novel written in screen play format, The Last Words of Dutch Schultz (1969); and the traditional prose-format novel The Wild Boys (1971).
In the 1960s, Burroughs joined and then left the Church of Scientology.
In talking about the experience, he claimed that the techniques and
philosophy of Scientology helped him and that he felt that further study
into Scientology would produce great results.[39] He was skeptical of the organization itself, and felt that it fostered an environment that did not accept critical discussion.[40] His subsequent critical writings about the church and his review of Inside Scientology by Robert Kaufman led to a battle of letters between Burroughs and Scientology supporters in the pages of Rolling Stone magazine.
Return to U.S.
In 1974, concerned about his friend's well-being, Allen Ginsberg gained for Burroughs a contract to teach creative writing at the City College of New York.
Burroughs successfully withdrew from heroin use and moved to New York.
He eventually found an apartment, affectionately dubbed "The Bunker", on
the Lower East Side of Manhattan at 222 Bowery. The dwelling was a partially converted YMCA gym, complete with lockers and communal showers. The building fell within New York City rent control
policies that made it extremely cheap; it was only about four hundred
dollars a month until 1981 when the rent control rules changed, doubling
the rent overnight.[41]
Burroughs added "teacher" to the list of jobs he did not like, as he
lasted only a semester as a professor; he found the students
uninteresting and without much creative talent. Although he needed
income desperately, he turned down a teaching position at the University at Buffalo
for $15,000 a semester. "The teaching gig was a lesson in never again.
You were giving out all this energy and nothing was coming back."[42] His savior was the newly arrived, twenty-one-year-old book seller and Beat Generation devotee James Grauerholz, who worked for Burroughs part-time as a secretary as well as in a book store.
It was Grauerholz who floated the idea of reading tours, something
similar to rock and roll touring, or stand-up comedian dates in clubs
across the country. Grauerholz had managed several rock bands in Kansas
and took the lead in booking for Burroughs reading tours that would help
support him throughout the next two decades. It raised his public
profile, eventually aiding in his obtaining new publishing contracts.
Through Grauerholz, Burroughs became a monthly columnist for the noted
popular culture magazine Crawdaddy, for which he interviewed Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page
in 1975. Burroughs decided to relocate back to the United States
permanently in 1976. He then began to associate with New York cultural
players such as Andy Warhol, John Giorno, Lou Reed, Patti Smith, and Susan Sontag, frequently entertaining them at the Bunker; he also visited venues like CBGB to watch the likes of Patti Smith perform.[43] Throughout early 1977, Burroughs collaborated with Southern and Dennis Hopper on a screen adaptation of Junky.
Financed by a reclusive acquaintance of Burroughs, the project lost
traction after financial problems and creative disagreements between
Hopper and Burroughs.
Organized by Columbia professor Sylvère Lotringer,
Giorno, and Grauerholz, the Nova Convention was a multimedia
retrospective of Burroughs's work held from November 30 to December 2,
1978, at various locations throughout New York. The event included
readings from Southern, Ginsberg, Smith, and Frank Zappa (who filled in at the last minute for Keith Richards, then entangled in a legal problem), in addition to panel discussions with Timothy Leary & Robert Anton Wilson and concerts featuring The B-52's, Suicide, Philip Glass, and Debbie Harry & Chris Stein.
In 1976, Billy Burroughs was eating dinner with his father and Allen Ginsberg in Boulder, Colorado, at Ginsberg’s Buddhist poetry school (Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics) at Chogyam Trungpa's Naropa University
when he began to vomit blood. Burroughs senior had not seen his son for
over a year and was alarmed at his appearance when Billy arrived at
Ginsberg’s apartment. Although Billy had successfully published two
short novels in the 1970s, and was deemed by literary critics like Ann Charters as a bona fide "second generation beat writer",[44]
his brief marriage to a teenage waitress had disintegrated. Under his
constant drinking, there were long periods where Billy was out of
contact with any of his family or friends. The diagnosis was liver cirrhosis so complete that the only treatment was a rarely performed liver transplant operation. Fortunately, the University of Colorado Medical Center was one of two places in the nation that performed transplants under the pioneering work of Dr. Thomas Starzl.
Billy underwent the procedure and beat the thirty-percent survival
odds. His father spent many months in 1976 and 1977 in Colorado, helping
Billy through many additional surgeries and complications. Ted Morgan’s
biography asserts that their relationship was not spontaneous and
lacked real warmth or intimacy. Allen Ginsberg was supportive to both
Burroughs and his son throughout the long period of recovery.[45]
In London, Burroughs had begun to write what would become the first novel of a trilogy. Between 1981 and 1987, he published Cities of the Red Night (1981); The Place of Dead Roads (1983); and The Western Lands (1987). Grauerholz helped edit Cities
when it was first rejected by Burroughs' long-time editor Dick Seaver
at Holt Rinehart, after it was deemed too disjointed. The novel was
written as a straight narrative and then chopped up into a more random
pattern, leaving the reader to sort through the characters and events.
This technique was definitely different from the author's earlier cut-up
methods, which were organically accidental from the start.
Nevertheless, the novel was reassembled and published, still without a
straight linear form, but with fewer breaks in the story. The
back-and-forth sway of the read replicated the theme of the trilogy;
time-travel adventures where Burroughs's narrators rewrite episodes in
history and thus reform mankind.[46] Reviews were mixed for Cities. Novelist and critic Anthony Burgess panned the work in Saturday Review, saying Burroughs was boring readers with repetitive episodes of pederast fantasy and sexual strangulation that lacked any comprehensible world view or theology; other reviewers, like J. G. Ballard, argued that Burroughs was shaping a new literary "mythography".[46]
In 1981, Billy Burroughs died in Florida. He had cut off contact with
his father several years before, even publishing an article in Esquire
magazine claiming the author had poisoned his life and revealing that
he had been molested by one of his father's friends as a
fourteen-year-old while visiting his father in Tangier, something that
he had previously kept to himself. The liver transplant
had not cured his urge to drink, and Billy suffered from serious health
complications years after the operation. He had stopped taking his transplant rejection
drugs and was found near the side of a Florida highway by a stranger.
He died shortly afterwards. Burroughs was in New York when he heard from
Allen Ginsberg of Billy's death.
Burroughs, by 1979, was once again addicted to heroin.
The cheap heroin that was easily purchased outside his door on the
Lower East Side "made its way" into his veins, coupled with "gifts" from
the overzealous if well-intentioned admirers who frequently visited the
Bunker. Although Burroughs would have episodes of being free from
heroin, from this point until his death he was regularly addicted to the
drug. He died in 1997 on a methadone maintenance program. In an introduction to Last Words: The Final Journals of William S. Burroughs,
James Grauerholz (who managed Burroughs's reading tours in the 1980s
and 1990s) mentions that part of his job was to deal with the
“underworld” in each city to secure the author’s needed drugs.[47]
Later years in Kansas
William S. Burroughs and James Grauerholz in the alley behind the Jazzhaus in Lawrence, Kansas (1996)
Burroughs moved to Lawrence, Kansas,
in 1981 and lived the remainder of his life there, at 1927 Learnard
Avenue. He once told a Wichita Eagle reporter that he was content to
live in Kansas, saying, “The thing I like about Kansas is that it’s not
nearly as violent, and it’s a helluva lot cheaper. And I can get out in
the country and fish and shoot and whatnot.”[48] In 1984 he signed a seven-book deal with Viking Press after he signed with literary agent Andrew Wylie. This deal included the publication rights to the 1953 unpublished novel Queer. With this money he purchased a small bungalow for $29,000.[49] He was finally inducted into the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters in 1983 after several attempts by Allen Ginsberg to get him accepted. He attended the induction ceremony in May 1983. Lawrence Ferlinghetti remarked the induction of Burroughs into the Academy proved Herbert Marcuse's point that capitalistic society had a great ability to incorporate its one-time outsiders.[50]
Burroughs became a counterculture figure and inspired 1970s proto punk rock band Doctors of Madness. In the 1980s he collaborated with performers ranging from Bill Laswell's Material and Laurie Anderson to Throbbing Gristle, Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy and Ministry, and in Gus Van Sant's 1989 film Drugstore Cowboy, playing a character based on a short story he published in Exterminator!, "The "Priest" They Called Him". In 1990, he released the spoken word album Dead City Radio, with musical back-up from producers Hal Willner and Nelson Lyon, and alternative rock band Sonic Youth. A collaboration with musicians Nick Cave and Tom Waits resulted in a collection of short prose, Smack My Crack, later released as a spoken word album in 1987. He also collaborated with Tom Waits and director Robert Wilson to create The Black Rider, a play which opened at the Thalia Theatre in Hamburg
in 1990, to critical acclaim, and was later performed all over Europe
and the U.S. In 1991, with Burroughs's sanction, director David Cronenberg took on the seemingly impossible task of adapting Naked Lunch into a full-length feature film. The film opened to critical acclaim.
In 1982 in Lawrence, Kansas, Burroughs developed a painting technique
whereby he created abstract compositions by placing spray paint cans
some distance in front of blank surfaces, and then shooting at the paint
cans with a shotgun. These splattered and shot panels and canvasses
were first exhibited in the Tony Shafrazi Gallery in New York City in
1987. By this time he had developed a comprehensive visual art practice,
using ink, spray paint, collage and unusual things such as mushrooms
and plungers to apply the paint. He created file-folder paintings
featuring these mediums as well as "automatic calligraphy" inspired by
Brion Gysin. He originally used the folders to mix pigments before
observing that they could be viewed as art in themselves.[51]
Until his last years, he prolifically created visual art. Burroughs'
work has since been featured in over 50 international galleries and
museums including Royal Academy of the Arts, Centre Pompidou, Guggenheim
Museum, ZKM Karlsruhe, Sammlung Falckenberg, New Museum, Irish Museum
of Modern Art, Los Angeles County Museum, and Whitney Museum of American
Art.[52]
In 1990 Burroughs was honored with a star on the St. Louis Walk of Fame.[53]
In June 1991 Burroughs underwent triple bypass surgery.[54]
He became a member of a chaos magic organization, the Illuminates of Thanateros, in 1993.[55]
Burroughs's final filmed performance was in the music video for "Last Night on Earth" by Irish rock band U2, filmed in Kansas City, Missouri, directed by Richie Smyth and also featuring Sophie Dahl.[56]
Death
Burroughs died in Lawrence, Kansas, on August 2, 1997, from complications of a heart attack he had suffered the previous day.[12] He was interred in the family plot in Bellefontaine Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri,[57]
with a marker bearing his full name and the epitaph "American Writer".
The grave lies to the right of the white granite obelisk of William Seward Burroughs I (1857–1898).
After his death
Since 1997, several posthumous collections of Burroughs's work have
been published. A few months after his death, a collection of writings
spanning his entire career, Word Virus, was published (according to the book's introduction, Burroughs himself approved its contents prior to his death).[21] Aside from numerous previously released pieces, Word Virus also included what was promoted as one of the few surviving fragments of And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks,
a then-unpublished novel by Burroughs and Kerouac (ultimately, however,
the complete work would be published in 2008). A collection of journal
entries written during the final months of Burroughs's life was
published as the book Last Words in 2000. Publication of a memoir by Burroughs entitled Evil River by Viking Press
has been delayed several times; after initially being announced for a
2005 release, Web retailers such as indicated a 2007 release, complete
with an ISBN number (ISBN 0670813516), but no such release has, to date, occurred.[58] In December 2007, Ohio State University Press released Everything Lost: The Latin American Journals of William S. Burroughs. Edited by Oliver Harris, the book contains transcriptions of journal entries made by Burroughs during the time of composing Queer and The Yage Letters., with cover art and review information. In addition, special editions of The Yage Letters, Naked Lunch and Junkie/Junky have been published in recent years, all containing additional material and essays on the works.
The complete Kerouac/Burroughs manuscript And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks was published for the first time in November 2008.[59]
In September 2010, Telos Publishing, a UK publisher, was scheduled to release the novel Rules of Duel, a previously unpublished late-60s collaboration between Burroughs and Graham Masterton.[60]
Literary style and periods
Burroughs's major works can be divided into four different periods.
The dates refer to the time of writing, not publication, which in some
cases was not until decades later:
- Early work (early 1950s): Junkie, Queer and The Yage Letters are relatively straightforward linear narratives, written in and about Burroughs's time in Mexico City and South America.
- The cut-up period (mid-1950s to mid-1960s): Naked Lunch is a fragmentary collection of "routines" from The Word Hoard – manuscripts written in Tangier, Paris, London, as well as of some other texts written in South America such as "The Composite City", blending into the cut-up and fold-in fiction also heavily drawn from The Word Hoard: The Soft Machine, Nova Express, The Ticket That Exploded, also referred to as "The Nova Trilogy" or "the Nova Epic", self-described by Burroughs as an attempt to create "a mythology for the space age". Interzone also derives from this period.
- Experiment and subversion (mid-1960s to mid-1970s): This period saw Burroughs continue experimental writing with increased political content and branching into multimedia such as film and sound recording. The only major novel written in this period was The Wild Boys, but he also wrote dozens of published articles, short stories, scrap books and other works, several in collaboration with Brion Gysin. The major anthologies representing work from this period are The Burroughs File, The Adding Machine and Exterminator!.
- The Red Night trilogy (mid-1970s to mid-1980s): The books Cities of the Red Night, The Place of Dead Roads and The Western Lands came from Burroughs in a final, mature stage, creating a complete mythology.
Burroughs also produced numerous essays and a large body of
autobiographical material, including a book with a detailed account of
his own dreams (My Education: A Book of Dreams).
Reaction to critics and view on criticism
Several literary critics treated Burroughs's work harshly. For example Anatole Broyard and Philip Toynbee
wrote devastating reviews of some of his most important books. In a
short essay entitled "A Review of the Reviewers", Burroughs answers his
critics in this way:
Critics constantly complain that writers are lacking in standards, yet they themselves seem to have no standards other than personal prejudice for literary criticism. (...) such standards do exist. Matthew Arnold set up three criteria for criticism: 1. What is the writer trying to do? 2. How well does he succeed in doing it? (...) 3. Does the work exhibit "high seriousness"? That is, does it touch on basic issues of good and evil, life and death and the human condition. I would also apply a fourth criterion (...) Write about what you know. More writers fail because they try to write about things they don't know than for any other reason.
—William S. Burroughs, "A Review of the Reviewers"[61]
Burroughs clearly indicates here that he prefers to be evaluated
against such criteria over being reviewed based on the reviewer's
personal reactions to a certain book. Always a contradictory figure,
Burroughs nevertheless criticized Anatole Broyard for reading authorial intentionality
into his works where there is none, which sets him at odds both with
New Criticism and the old school as represented by Mathew Arnold.
Legacy
Burroughs is often called one of the greatest and most influential writers of the 20th century, most notably by Norman Mailer
whose quote on Burroughs, "The only American novelist living today who
may conceivably be possessed by genius", appears on many Burroughs
publications. Others consider his concepts and attitude more influential
than his prose. Prominent admirers of Burroughs's work have included British critic and biographer Peter Ackroyd, the rock critic Lester Bangs, the philosopher Gilles Deleuze and the authors J. G. Ballard, Angela Carter, Jean Genet, William Gibson, Alan Moore, Kathy Acker and Ken Kesey. Burroughs had a profound influence on the German writer Carl Weissner,
who in addition to being his German translator was a novelist in his
own right and frequently wrote cut-up texts in a manner reminiscent of
Burroughs.[62]
Burroughs continues to be named as an influence by contemporary writers of fiction. Both the New Wave and, especially, the cyberpunk schools of science fiction are indebted to him. Admirers from the late 1970s—early 1980s milieu of this subgenre include William Gibson and John Shirley, to name only two. First published in 1982, the British slipstream fiction magazine Interzone (which later evolved into a more traditional science fiction magazine) paid tribute to him with its choice of name. He is also cited as a major influence by musicians Roger Waters, Patti Smith, Genesis P-Orridge, Ian Curtis, Lou Reed, Laurie Anderson, Tom Waits and Kurt Cobain.[63]
Drugs, homosexuality and death, common among Burroughs's themes, have been taken up by Dennis Cooper, of whom Burroughs said, "Dennis Cooper, God help him, is a born writer".[64] Cooper, in return, wrote, in his essay 'King Junk', "along with Jean Genet, John Rechy, and Ginsberg, [Burroughs] helped make homosexuality seem cool and highbrow, providing gay liberation with a delicious edge". Splatterpunk writer Poppy Z. Brite
has frequently referenced this aspect of Burroughs's work. Burroughs's
writing continues to be referenced years after his death; for example, a
November 2004 episode of the TV series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
included an evil character named Dr. Benway (named for an amoral
physician who appears in a number of Burroughs's works.) This is an echo
of the hospital scene in the movie Repo Man, made during Burroughs's lifetime, in which both Dr. Benway and Mr. Lee (a Burroughs pen name) are paged.
Burroughs was cited by Robert Anton Wilson as the first person to notice the "23 Enigma":
I first heard of the 23 Enigma from William S. Burroughs, author of Naked Lunch, Nova Express, etc. According to Burroughs, he had known a certain Captain Clark, around 1960 in Tangier, who once bragged that he had been sailing 23 years without an accident. That very day, Clark’s ship had an accident that killed him and everybody else aboard. Furthermore, while Burroughs was thinking about this crude example of the irony of the gods that evening, a bulletin on the radio announced the crash of an airliner in Florida, USA. The pilot was another Captain Clark and the flight was Flight 23.
—Robert Anton Wilson, Fortean Times[65]
Appearances in media
In music
Burroughs appears on the cover of The Beatles' eighth studio album, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Burroughs participated on numerous album releases by Giorno Poetry Systems, including The Nova Convention (featuring Frank Zappa, John Cage, and Philip Glass) and You're the Guy I Want to Share My Money With (with John Giorno and Laurie Anderson).
He is featured in a spoken word piece entitled "Sharkey's Night" on Laurie Anderson's 1984 album Mister Heartbreak,
but the longer version of this track, with additional dialogue from
Burroughs, was released only on a promotional 4-track 12" Ep (Warner
Bros PRO-A-2123). In addition, Burroughs provided vocal samples for the
soundtrack of Anderson's 1986 concert film, Home of the Brave, and made a cameo appearance in it.
Bill Laswell's Material collaborated with Burroughs to produce the 1989 album Seven Souls, wherein Burroughs recites passages from his book The Western Lands
to musical accompaniment. The album was reissued in 1997 with 3 bonus
remixes. In 1998, an additional unreleased six remixes (plus one
previously released) were introduced on the album The Road To The Western Lands. Spring Heel Jack's remix of the track '"The Road to the Western Lands" from this album was also included on their Oddities album from 2000.
In 1990, Island Records released Dead City Radio, a collection of readings set to a broad range of musical compositions. It was produced by Hal Willner and Nelson Lyon, with musical accompaniment from John Cale, Donald Fagen, Lenny Pickett, Chris Stein, Sonic Youth, and others. The remastered edition of Sonic Youth's album Goo includes a longer version of "Dr. Benway's House", which had appeared, in shorter form, on Dead City Radio.
In 1992 he recorded "Quick Fix" with Ministry, which appeared on their single for "Just One Fix".
The single featured cover art by Burroughs and a remix of the song
dubbed the "W.S.B. mix". Burroughs also made an appearance in the video
for "Just One Fix". The same year he also recorded the EP The "Priest" They Called Him; Burroughs reads the short story of the same name, while Kurt Cobain creates layers of guitar feedback and distortion. Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic
is featured on the cover as the titular "Priest". The track on the 13th
Ministry album "Thanx but No Thanx" makes use of William S. Burroughs's
poem "A Thanksgiving Prayer", as read by Sgt. Major.
In 1992 Burroughs worked with The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy on Spare Ass Annie and Other Tales,
with the duo providing musical background and accompaniment to
Burroughs's spoken readings from several of his books. A 12" Ep was
released with five different remixes of the Spare Ass Annie track Words of Advice for Young People, all done by Bill Laswell.
Burroughs recites the lyrics of R.E.M.'s "Star Me Kitten" for a special version of the song on the Songs in the Key of X: Music from and Inspired by the X-Files soundtrack.
Burroughs appears near the end of U2's music video "Last Night on Earth", pushing a shopping cart with a large spotlight positioned inside it. The video ends with a close up of his eyes.
Burroughs is featured on the 2000 compilation tribute album, Stoned Immaculate,
on a track that pairs Jim Morrison yelping and groaning with Burroughs
reading Morrison's poetry. The music was recorded by the surviving Doors
members in 2000 specifically for this album.[66]
Band names
Numerous bands have found their names in Burroughs's work. The most widely known of these is Steely Dan, a group named after a dildo in Naked Lunch.[67] Also from Naked Lunch came the names Clarknova, The Mugwumps and The Insect Trust. The novel Nova Express inspired the names of Grant Hart's post-Hüsker Dü band Nova Mob, as well as Australian 1960s R&B band Nova Express.[68] British band Soft Machine took its moniker from the Burroughs novel of the same name. Alt-country band Clem Snide is named for a Burroughs character. Thin White Rope took their name from Burroughs's euphemism for ejaculation.[69]
The American extreme metal band Success Will Write Apocalypse Across the Sky took their name from the 1989 text "Apocalypse",[70] in which Burroughs describes "art and creative expression taking a literal and physical form".[71]
In film and television
Burroughs played Opium Jones in the 1966 Conrad Rooks cult film Chappaqua, which also featured cameo roles by Allen Ginsberg, Moondog, and others. In 1968, an abbreviated—77 minutes as opposed to the original's 104 minutes—version of Benjamin Christensen's 1922 film Häxan was released, subtitled Witchcraft Through The Ages. This version, produced by Anthony Balch, featured an eclectic jazz score by Daniel Humair and expressionist narration by Burroughs.[72] He also appeared alongside Brion Gysin in a number of short films in the 1960s directed by Balch.[73] Jack Sargeant's book Naked Lens: Beat Cinema details Burroughs film work at length, covering his collaborations with Balch and Burroughs' theories of film.
Burroughs narrated part of the 1980 documentary Shamans of the Blind Country by anthropologist and filmmaker Michael Oppitz.[74] He gave a reading on Saturday Night Live on November 7, 1981, in an episode hosted by Lauren Hutton.
In 1983 director Howard Brookner released Burroughs: the Movie.
The film is perhaps the definitive account of Burroughs' life and
Brookner and Burroughs maintained a very close collaboration during the
shooting process. The film features interviews with many of Burroughs'
friends and collaborators including Allen Ginsberg, Brion Gysin, Francis Bacon, Herbert Huncke, Patti Smith and Terry Southern.
Burroughs subsequently made cameo appearances in a number of other films and videos, such as David Blair's Wax or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees, an elliptic story about the first Gulf War in which Burroughs plays a beekeeper, and Decoder by Klaus Maeck. He played an aging junkie priest in Gus Van Sant's 1989 film Drugstore Cowboy. He also appears briefly at the beginning of Van Sant's Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (based on the Tom Robbins novel),
in which he is seen crossing a city street; as the noise of the city
rises around him he pauses in the middle of the intersection and speaks
the single word "ominous". Van Sant's short film "Thanksgiving Prayer"
features Burroughs reading the poem "Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 28, 1986",
from Tornado Alley, intercut with a collage of black and white images.
Burroughs was portrayed by Kiefer Sutherland in the 2000 film Beat,
written and directed by Gary Walkow. Loosely biographical, the plot
involves a car trip to Mexico City with Vollmer, Kerouac, Ginsberg, and
Lucien Carr, and includes a scene of Vollmer's shooting.
Burroughs is portrayed by Ben Foster in the 2013 film Kill Your Darlings,
directed by John Krokidas and written by John Krokidas and Austin Bunn.
The film tells the story of Lucien Carr (Dane DeHaan) and David
Kammerer (Michael C. Hall), with appearances by actors playing Ginsberg
(Daniel Radcliffe) and Kerouac (Jack Huston).[75]
Near the end of his life, recordings of Burroughs reading his short
stories "A Junky's Christmas" and "Ah Pook is Here" were used on the
soundtracks of two highly acclaimed animated films.[76]
Filmmakers Lars Movin and Steen Moller Rasmussen used footage of
Burroughs taken during a 1983 tour of Scandinavia in the documentary Words of Advice: William S. Burroughs on the Road. A 2010 documentary, William S. Burroughs: A Man Within, was made for Independent Lens on PBS.
As a fictional character
Burroughs was fictionalized in Jack Kerouac's autobiographical novel On the Road as "Old Bull Lee". He also makes an appearance in J. G. Ballard's semi-autobiographical 1991 novel The Kindness of Women. In the 2004 novel Move Under Ground, Burroughs, Kerouac, and Neal Cassady team up to defeat Cthulhu.
Burroughs appears in the first part of The Illuminatus! Trilogy by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson during the 1968 Democratic Convention riots
and is described as a person devoid of anger, passion, indignation,
hope, or any other recognizable human emotion. He is presented as a
polar opposite of Allen Ginsberg, as Ginsberg believed in everything and Burroughs believed in nothing. Wilson would recount in his Cosmic Trigger II: Down to Earth having interviewed both Burroughs and Ginsberg for Playboy
the day the riots began, as well as his experiences with Shea during
the riots, providing some detail on the creation of the fictional
sequence.
Bibliography
Main article: William S. Burroughs bibliography
William
S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
Notes
- 2003 Penguin Modern Classics edition of Junky.
- Biography, The Guardian
- Naked Lunch: The Restored Text, Harper Perennial Modern Classics (2005). It includes an introduction by J. G. Ballard and an appendix of biography and reference to further reading: "About the author", "About the book" and "Read on".
- William S Burroughs Popsubculture.com Biography.
- Morgan, Ted, Literary Outlaw, p. 44.
- Word Virus: The William S. Burroughs Reader. James Grauerholz, Ira Silverberg, Ann Douglas (eds), Grove Press, 2000, p. 21.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 26.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, papers, p. 62.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 611.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 65.
- Consumer Price Index (estimate) 1800–2014. Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. Retrieved February 27, 2014.
- Severo, Richard (August 3, 1997). "William S. Burroughs Dies at 83; Member of the Beat Generation Wrote 'Naked Lunch'". New York Times. Retrieved 2007-10-22.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, pp. 65–8.
- Grauerholz, James. Introduction p. xv, in William Burroughs. Interzone. New York: Viking Press, 1987.
- Johnson, Joyce (2012). The Voice Is All: The Lonely Victory of Jack Kerouac. Penguin Group. ISBN 9780670025107.
- Grauerholz, James. "The Death of Joan Vollmer Burroughs: What Really Happened?". American Studies Department, University of Kansas. lawrence.com. Retrieved 2008-07-28.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 202.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 214.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, pp. 197–198.
- Queer, Penguin, 1985, p. xxiii.
- James Grauerholz. Word Virus, New York: Grove, 1998.
- "William S. Borroughs." Biography.com.
- Bill Morgan, I Celebrate Myself, 2006, New York: Viking Press, p. 159.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, pp. 232–34.
- James Grauerholz writes, in Interzone, the body of text that Burroughs was working on was called Interzone, see Burroughs, William S. Interzone. "Introduction", pp. ix–xiii. New York: Viking Press, 1987.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 238.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, pp. 238–42.
- Miles, Barry "The Inventive Mind of Brion Gysin" in José Férez Kuri (ed) Brion Gysin: Tuning in to the Multimedia Age, London: Thames and Hudson, 2003, p.124-125.
- Burroughs, William S., Ports of Entry – Here is Space-Time Painting, p.32.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 355.
- Ginsberg, Allen. Postcard to John Ciardi. 11 July 1959. MS. Stuart Wright Collection: Richard Ghormley Eberhart Papers. Joyner Lib., Greenville, NC.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 425.
- Grauerholz, James. Introduction p. xviii, in William Burroughs. Interzone. New York: Viking Press, 1987.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p.316-326.
- Dent, John Yerbury. Anxiety and Its Treatment. London: J. Murray, 1941.
- Stratton, Richard. "Keith Richards Interview 1978". High Times Reader. New York: Thunder's Mouth, Nation Books, 2004.
- Burroughs, William, S. "Afterword". Speed/Kentucky Ham: Two Novels. New York: Overlook Press, 1984.
- Lee Hill A Grand Guy: The Art and Life of Terry Southern.
- David S. Wills, "The Weird Cult: William S. Burroughs and Scientology", Beatdom Literary Journal, December 2011.
- Burroughs on Scientology, Los Angeles Free Press, March 6, 1970.
- Bockris, Victor. With William Burroughs: A Report From the Bunker. New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 1996.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 477.
- Thurston Moore interview on William Burroughs
- Charters, Ann. "Introduction". Speed/Kentucky Ham: Two Novels. New York: Overlook Press, 1984.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, pp. 495–536.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 565.
- Burroughs, William. "Introduction". Last Words: The Final Journals of William S. Burroughs. New York: Grove Press, 2000.
- "Godfather of Beat Generation was content to live last days in Kansas", Wichita Eagle and Kansas.com, April 5, 2010.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 596.
- Morgan, Literary Outlaw, p. 577.
- WILLIAM S.BURROUGHS 'Life-File' at Beak Street.
- "William Burroughs Biography", October Gallery.
- St. Louis Walk of Fame - William Burroughs, St. Louis Walk of Fame, 2008, retrieved 25 April 2013
- "The Life of William S. Burroughs: A timeline," Phil Cauthon, lawrence.com. July 30, 2007. Retrieved: May 24, 2010.
- Grant, Douglas (2003). "Magick and Photography". Ashé Journal. Rebel Satori Press. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
- William S. Burroughs: Overview from msn.com
- "William S. Burroughs". Find a Grave. Retrieved October 19, 2010.
- Reality Studio.org: Evil River-A Burroughs Memoir?, a 2005 discussion on the origin of this book.
- Chris Hastings and Beth Jones, "New Jack Kerouac book to be published, The Telegraph, March 2, 2008 . Retrieved March 3, 2008.
- Telos Publishing catalogue entry, accessed August 9, 2010.
- Burroughs, William S. The Adding Machine: Selected Essays. Arcade Publishing, 1993
- "In Memory of Carl Weissner". Reality Studio. 25 January 2012. Retrieved 25 February 2012.
- Wills, D. 'Modern Beats: Tom Waits', in Wills, D. (ed.), Beatdom, Vol. 3 (Dundee: Mauling Press, 2007) p. ????
- Cooper, Dennis (2003). My Loose Thread. Canongate Books. p. 1. ISBN 9781841954127.
- Robert Anton Wilson (May 2007). "The 23 Phenomenon". Fortean Times. Retrieved 2008-09-25.
- Stoned Immaculate liner notes
- FAQ from the Official Steely Dan website
- Nova Express, band profile
- http://www.allmusic.com/artist/p5634/biography
- Murphy, Timothy S. (1998). "Nothing Is True, Everything Is Permitted". Wising Up the Marks: The Amodern William Burroughs. Berkeley, California: University of California Press. p. 6. ISBN 0-520-20951-6. Retrieved June 23, 2009.
- G., Richard (April 2009). "Success Will Write Apocalypse Across the Sky interview". Lords of Metal. Retrieved June 23, 2009.
- Mark Bourne (2001). "Häxan / Witchcraft Through the Ages: The Criterion Collection". DVD Journal. Retrieved 2008-10-24.
- U B U W E B : William S. Burroughs Films
- Ausgewählte Publikationen von Michael Oppitz from the website of the Ethnographic Museum of the University of Zürich.
- "The Watchful Years, Before the Howling Began" (movie review), New York Times, October 15, 2013.
- Wills, David, "Naked Lunch on Film" in Beatdom, Vol. 5 (City of Recovery Press, 2009), p. 30.
References
- James Grauerholz, Ira Silverberg, Ann Douglas (eds.) (2000). Word Virus: The William S. Burroughs Reader. New York: Grove Press. 576 pages. ISBN 0-8021-3694-X, ISBN 9780802136947. OCLC 57590795.
- Ted Morgan (1988). Literary Outlaw: The Life and Times of William S. Burroughs. New York: Avon. ISBN 0-8050-0901-9
- Thomas Wason (February 15, 1951). "William Burroughs". Mexico City Collegian. p. 6.
Further reading
Published materials
- Charters, Ann (ed.). The Portable Beat Reader. New York: Penguin Books, 1992. ISBN 0-670-83885-3 (hc); ISBN 0-14-015102-8 (pbk).
- Gilmore, John. Laid Bare: A Memoir of Wrecked Lives and the Hollywood Death Trip. Searching for Rimbaud. Amok Books, 1997.
- Harris, Oliver. William S. Burroughs and the Secret of Fascination. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 2003.
- Johnson, Robert Earl. The Lost Years of William S. Burroughs: Beats in South Texas. Texas A&M University Press, 2006.
- Miles, Barry. William Burroughs: El Hombre Invisible, A Portrait. New York: Hyperion, 1992.
- Sargeant, Jack. "Naked Lens: Beat Cinema" New York: Soft Skull, 2009 (third edition).
- Schneiderman, Davis and Philip Walsh. Retaking the Universe: William S. Burroughs in the Age of Globalization. London: Pluto Press, 2004.
- Stevens, Michael. The Road to Interzone: Reading William S. Burroughs Reading. suicide press, Archer City, Texas 2009.
- Wills, David S. Scientologist! William S. Burroughs and the Weird Cult. Beatdom Books, London 2013.
Archival sources
- William S. Burroughs papers (17 linear feet - 94 boxes) are held by the Berg Collection of the New York Public Library.
- William Seward Burroughs Papers, 1957–1976 (2 linear feet) are held in the Columbia University Libraries.
- William S. Burroughs Papers, SPEC.CMS.40 (ca. 1945-ca. 1984, 55 boxes plus additions) are held in the Ohio State University Libraries.
- William S. Burroughs Papers, SPEC.CMS.85 (ca. 1945-ca. 1984, 6 boxes) are held in the Ohio State University Libraries.
- William S. Burroughs Papers, SPEC.CMS.87 (ca. 1945-ca. 1984, 58 boxes) are held in the Ohio State University Libraries.
- William S. Burroughs Papers, SPEC.CMS.90 (ca. 1945-ca. 1984, 29 boxes) are held in the Ohio State University Libraries.
- William S. Burroughs collection (3 linear feet) are held in the Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library at Emory University.
- William S. Burroughs Collection, MS 63 (ca. 1954-1966, 2 boxes), and William S. Burroughs Last Words Collection, in processing (10 bound volumes and 2 boxes), are held at the Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas
External links
- William S. Burroughs at the Internet Movie Database
- Conrad Knickerbocker (Fall 1965). "William S. Burroughs, The Art of Fiction No. 36". The Paris Review.
- RealityStudio fan site with texts, community, scholarship, criticism
- William S. Burroughs Internet Database at Southeast Missouri State University
- International festivities for 50th anniversary of Naked Lunch
- A gallery of Burroughs book cover designs
- Artist Malcolm McNeill: On Beat Writer William Burroughs, Interview by George Laughead, August 2007
- Doom Patrols: 10. WILLIAM BURROUGHS by Steven Shaviro
- William Burroughs and Tom Waits
- Interview excerpt from RE/Search
- Shooting Joan Burroughs by George Laughead
- Allen Ginsberg & William S. Burroughs, Last Public Appearance November 2, 1996 Lawrence, KS
- European Beat Studies Network
- William S. Burroughs: A Man Within site for Independent Lens on PBS
- William S. Burroughs: A Man Within at the Internet Movie Database
- William S. Burroughs interviewed by Allen Ginsberg, March 1992 in Lawrence, Kansas, from Sensitive Skin Magazine #8, published April, 2012
- Burroughs on Bowery, a film by Marc Olmsted of Burroughs in NYC in 1977
- Anything but Routine: A Selectively Annotated Bibliography of William S. Burroughs v 2.0 by Brian E.C. Schottlaender, UC San Diego, 2010
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William S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
Obras
Burroughs escribió a lo largo de cuarenta años. Algunas de sus obras más relevantes son:
- Y los hipopótamos se cocieron en sus tanques (1953), con Jack Kerouac
- Yonqui (1953), bajo el seudónimo de Bill Lee
- El almuerzo desnudo (1959), escrita en Tánger, un lugar que apreció singularmente.
- La máquina blanda (1961)
- Nova Express (1963)
- Los chicos salvajes (1971)
- Exterminador (1973)
- Ciudades de la noche roja (1981)
- El lugar de los caminos muertos (1984)
- Queer (1985)
- Tierras del Occidente (1987)
- Gato Encerrado (1986)
- El fantasma accidental
- Las últimas palabras de Dutch Schultz
- La revolución electrónica (1970)
- Snack
- Mi educación
- El metro blanco
- El ticket que explotó
Filmografía sobre Burroughs y sobre su obra y pensamiento
- Junky's Christmas, de Nick Donkin y Francis Ford Coppola.
- Go Go Second Time Virgin, de Koji Wakamatsu.
- Four Films Tower Open Fire, de Antony Balch.
- Querelle, de Rainer Werner Fassbinder (narrador).
- William Burroughs, de Jean-Francois Vallée.
- Tokio Fist, de Shinya Tsukamoto.
- Psychic TV Ghost at Number 9, de Antony Balch.
- Visitor Q, de Takashi Miike.
- El almuerzo desnudo, de David Cronenberg.
- Drogas, amor y muerte (Drugstore Cowboy), de Gus Van Sant.
- A Man Within, de Yony Leyser.
En el álbum tributo a la banda de rock estadounidense The Doors llamado Stoned Immaculate: The Music of The Doors, del año 2000, en el tema «Is Everybody In?» aparece el escritor William Burroughs recitando poesía de Jim Morrison.
William Burroughs aparece en el vídeo del tema «Just One Fix» del grupo Ministry.
El autor aparece como personaje de cómic, con el nombre de Billy Sorrows en la obra de Juanjo Guarnido y Juan Díaz Canales, Amarillo, de la serie BlackSad.
- Burroughs on Scientology, Los Angeles Free Press, Mar 6, 1970.
- William Burroughs: Metáfora paranoica y Literatura conspirativa
- Documental 52': William S. Burroughs
- Documental Experimental con una Entrevista a William S. Burroughs Nova Express hassan Sabbah
- William Burroughs: Literatura ectoplasmoide y mutaciones antropológicas. Del virus del lenguaje a la psicotopografía del texto por Adolfo Vasquez Rocca en Nomadas UCM - PDF
- William S. Burroughs y Jacques Derrida; Literatura parasitaria y Cultura Replicante por Adolfo Vásquez Rocca UNAM - PDF
William S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
William S. Burroughs By Adolfo Vásquez Rocca D.Phil
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