Bøger af William S. Burroughs

A cultural landmark and the most shocking novel in the English language, Naked Lunch is an exhilarating ride into the darkest recesses of the human psyche. An unnerving tale of an addict unmoored in New York, Tangier, and ultimately a nightmarish wasteland known as Interzone, Naked Lunch's formal innovation, formerly taboo subject matter, and tour de force execution has exerted its influence authors like Thomas Pynchon and J. G. Ballard; on the relationship of art and obscenity; and on the shape of music, film, and media in general.

Both heartwarming and meditative, The Cat Inside explores not only the personal relationship between Burroughs and cats, but the deeper relationship of cats with mankind, which Burroughs traces back to the Egyptians. This book of moving and witty discourse is for both Burroughs fans and cat lovers alike.

Burroughs first novel, a largely autobiographical account of the constant cycle of drug dependency, cures and relapses, remains the most unflinching, unsentimental account of addiction ever written. Through junk neighbourhoods in New York, New Orleans and Mexico City, through time spent kicking, time spent dealing and time rolling drunks for money, through junk sickness and a sanatorium, Junky is a field report (by a writer trained in anthropology at Harvard) from the American post-war drug underground. A cult classic, it has influenced generations of writers with its raw, sparse and unapologetic tone. This definitive edition painstakingly recreates the author s original text word for word.

William S. Burroughs stærke og mesterlige debutroman. Da den trediveårige William Lee en dag stifter bekendtskab med junk, ændrer hans liv sig fuldstændigt. Den sikre, privilegerede hverdag, han voksede op i, bliver udskiftet med det evige jag efter stoffer, og mens hans krop og sind langsomt bliver indhyllet i junkens afhængighedståger, falder Lee ned i den mørke, brutale slum, som ikke blot fører ham igennem det amerikanske landskab, men også gennem landets historie, mentalitet og forfald. Med William Lees eget udtryk: Junken vinder, fordi der ikke er andet Nummer 2 i serien Mesterlige Debuter

Interzone portrays the development of Burroughs's mature writing style by presenting a selection of pieces from the mid-1950s. His outrageous tone of voice represents the exorcism of four decades of oppressive sexual and social conditioning. Burroughs's close observations of humanity - its ugliness and ignorance - invites the reader to dispense with their traditional notions of decorum, and taste the world as he sees it.

In this funny, nightmarish masterpiece of imaginative excess, grotesque characters engage in acts of violent one-upmanship, boundless riches mangle a corner of Africa into a Bacchanalian utopia, and technology, flesh and violence fuse with and undo each other. A fragmentary, freewheeling novel, it sees wild boys engage in vigorous, ritualistic sex and drug taking, as well as pranksterish guerrilla warfare and open combat with a confused and outmatched army. The Wild Boys shows why Burroughs is a writer unlike any other, able to make captivating the explicit and horrific.

Devilde drenge er en dødebogog i den forstand beslægtet med klassiske manualer til at navigere med idødsriget, som de ægyptiske og tibetanske dødebøger. I bogen optræder mange temaer fra Burroughsrumalder-mytologi, som især udvikledes op gennem 1960’erne, hvor hanfantaserede om at skabe sit eget Akademi 23 til at vække og oplære den kommendegeneration. Centralt for mytologien er kampen mellem et Én-Guds-Univers og etMagisk Univers, anstrengelserne for at undgå den sociale kontrols mekanismer,jagten på at transcendere dualitetens biologiske fælde, samt evnen til atomskrive fortiden og skabe fremtiden. Kampen mellemde to systemer, Én-Guds-Univers og Magisk Univers, konkretiseres i de vildedrenges kamp med de sidste rester af den vestlige civilisation, som vi kendteden, der nu bor i totalitære enklaver, og de revolutionære stammer af ungedrenge der lever i en utopisk, instinktiv tilstand. Hos de vilde drenge harskarp træning i guerillataktikker medført specialiserede biologiske mutationerog den totale udlevelse af begær har skabt en magisk frigørelsesteknologi.Gennem brugen af magi og sex har de vilde drenge opdaget en måde at genskabe dedøde på og har derved frigjort sig fra den biologiske afhængighed af kvinder,fødsel og død. I stedet kan de krydse tærsklen mellem de levendes og de dødesrige og eksistere i en slags shamanistisk grænsetilstand mellem verdenerne.

Originally written in 1952 but not published till 1985, Queer is an enigma - both an unflinching autobiographical self-portrait and a coruscatingly political novel, Burroughs' only realist love story and a montage of comic-grotesque fantasies that paved the way for his masterpiece, Naked Lunch. Set in Mexico City during the early fifties, Queer follows William Lee's hopeless pursuit of desire from bar to bar in the American expatriate scene. As Lee breaks down, the trademark Burroughsian voice emerges; a maniacal mix of self-lacerating humor and the Ugly American at his ugliest. A haunting tale of possession and exorcism, Queer is also a novel with a history of secrets, as this new edition reveals.

“Mit forhold til mine katte har reddet mig fra en dræbende, gennemtrængende uvidenhed.”, skriver Burroughs i bogen The Cat Inside fra 1986. I første omgang udkom denne bog blot i 133 eksklusive eksemplarer (med illustrationer af Brion Gysin). Først i 1992 kom den så i en decideret masseudgave. Uanset hvad er kattebogen mærkværdigt nok forblevet et overset værk i USA såvel som i Danmark. The Cat Inside består af en række selvbiografiske tekster, korte og simple. Burroughs køber kattemad i et supermarked, han nusser med sine yndlingskatte, Calico Jane, Ruski, Fletch, Smoky. Han bor i sit hus på landet, i Kansas, han flytter, kattene flytter naturligvis med. En kat løber væk, en anden skal afhentes på internat, en tredje klatrer op i træ, en fjerde dør. Tonen er på samme tid sårbar, rørende og humoristisk, og de enkelte og enkle tekster har karakter af erindringer, dagbogsoptegnelser, minder, strøtanker, observationer, refleksioner. Og til tider af udsyrede visioner, hallucinatoriske syner og drømmescenarier, hvor man møder hybrider af katte og andre dyr, flyvende katte, sumpkatte og natkatte med kæmpestore selvlysende øjne. Det er Burroughs, som man kender ham, men samtidig er det en anden side af Burroughs, man støder på i bogen. Det er også en ældre Burroughs. På trods af kattebogens tilsyneladende tilforladelige emne, rummer den trøsteløse og ætsende visioner af verden: en fortvivlelse over menneskets forbløffende evne til at destruere.Vi slår hinanden ihjel, vi udøver vold, vi fælder regnskovene. Men til fordel for hvad? spørger Burroughs, som på en måde har skrevet (endnu) en science fiction: Det er, som om verden er gået under og de eneste overlevende og tilbageblevne væsener er Burroughs og kattene, der lever i en form for posthumanistisk fællesskab. De sidste vidner. De sidste vidner til en sorg, en sorg der viser sig at være uden vidner.

Denne bog er dedikeret til de ældgamle guder, til afskyelighedernes herre, Humwawa, hvis ansigt er en klump indvolde, hvis ånde er stanken af lort og dødens parfume, forrådnelsens herre, den mørke engel over alt, der udskides og forsures, fremtidens herre som rider på en hviskende søndenvind, til Pazuzu, pestens og feberens herre, de fire vindes mørke engel med rådnende genitalier, fra hvilke han hyler gennem skarpslebne tænder over smittede byer, til Kutulu, den sovende slange som ikke kan påkaldes, til Akhkharuerne som suger menneskets blod i ønsket om at blive mennesker, til Lalussu som hjemsøger menneskets steder, til Gelal og Lilit som invaderer menneskets senge, og hvis børn fødes på hemmelige steder, til Addu, stormbringeren som kan oplyse nattehimlen, til Malah, herre over mod og tapperhed, til Zahgurim, hvis tal er 23 og som dræber på en unaturlig måde, til Zahrim, en kriger blandt krigere, til Itzamna, morgendisen og regnskyllenes ånd, til Ix Chel, spindelvævet-der-fanger-morgenduggen, til jomfruilden Zuhuy Kak, til Ah Dziz, kuldens mester, til Kak U Pacat, som arbejder i ild, til Ix Tab, gudinden af reb og snarer, beskytter af de som hænger sig selv, til Schmuun, den stille, tvillingebror til Ix Tab, til Xolotl, den uformede, genfødslens herre, til Aguchi, ejakulationernes mester, til Osiris og Amen i fallisk form, til Hex Chun Chan, den farlige, til Apook, ødelæggeren, til Den Store Gamle og Stjernebæstet, til Pan, panikkens gud, til opløsningens og tomhedens navnløse guder, til Hassan I Sabbah, snigmordernes mester.Til alle de forfattere og kunstnere og udøvere af magi gennem hvilke disse ånder har manifesteret sig… INTET ER SANDT. ALT ER TILLADT.

As this new edition reveals, the cultural reach of The Ticket That Exploded has expanded with the viral logic of Burroughs's multimedia methods, recycling itself into our digital environment. A last chance antidote to the virus of lies spread by the ad men and con men of the Nova Mob, Burroughs's book is an outrageous hybrid of pulp science fiction, obscene experimental poetry, and manifesto for revolution-as fresh today as it ever has been. Edited from the original manuscripts by renowned Burroughs scholar Oliver Harris, this revised edition incorporates an introduction and appendices of never before seen materials.

Imprint date taken from page 4 of cover.

In 1944, Jack Kerouac and William S. Burroughs were charged as accessories to murder. One of their friends, Lucien Carr, had stabbed another, David Kammerrer. Carr had come to each of them and confessed; Kerouac helped him get rid of the weapon - neither told the police. For this failing they were arrested. Months later, the two writers - unpublished at the time - collaborated on And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks, a fictionalized account of the summer of the killing.

An intense, compelling conversation between legendary Beat icons William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, featuring photos by Ginsberg, and details of Burroughs' shamanic exorcism of the demon that led him to shoot his wife and drove his work as a writer.

This surreal fable, set in America's Old West, features a cast of notorious characters: The Crying Gun, who breaks into tears at the sight of his opponent; The Priest, who goes into gunfights giving his adversaries the last rites; and The Nihilistic Kid himself, Kim Carson, a homosexual gunslinger who, with a succession of beautiful sidekicks, sets out to challenge the morality of small-town America and fight for intergalactic freedom. Fantastical and humorous, The Place of Dead Roads continues William Burroughs' exploration of society's controlling forces - the State, the Church, women, literature, drugs - with a style that is utterly unique in twentieth-century literature.

With a dangerous blend of chemistry and magic, secret agent Lee has the ability to change bodies - his own, or with anyone he chooses. Also able to time travel, he finds himself forced to use his skills to defeat a team of priests, who are using mind control to produce their own private slave race. Dead soldiers, African street urchins, evil doctors, corrupt judges and monsters from the mythology of history and science all feature in Lee's terrifying adventure. A surreal space odyssey, The Soft Machine is the first book in Burrough's innovative 'cut-up' trilogy - followed by Nova Express and The Ticket That Exploded - and a ferocious assault on hype, poverty, war and addiction in all its forms.

Inspector Lee and the Nova Police have been forced to engage the Nova Mob in one final battle for the planet. This is Burroughs's nightmare vision of scientists and combat troops, of Johnny Yen's chicken-hypnotizing and green Venusian-boy-girls, of ad men and conmen whose destructive language has spread like an incurable disease; a virus and parasite that takes over every human body. One of Burroughs's most approachable works, The Ticket That Exploded is the climax of his innovative 'cut-up' Nova trilogy - following The Soft Machine and Nova Express - and is an enthralling and frightening image of the future.

Beginning as surprisingly formal notes from the road to his friends Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac, the letters gradually deepen in substance and style. Burroughs's letters show the development of both the man and the writer, vividly documenting his (often turbulent) personal and cultural history. The collection provides a key to opening up and contextualizing Burroughs's fiction, but more than that it shows how letter-writing was itself integral to his life and creative process.

My Education is Burroughs's last novel, first published two years before his death in 1997. It is a book of dreams, collected over several decades and as close to a memoir as we will see. The dreams cover themes from the mundane and ordinary - conversations with his friends Allen Ginsberg or Ian Sommerville, feeding his cats, procuring drugs or sex - to the erotic, bizarre and visionary. Always a rich source of imagery in Burroughs's own fiction, in this book dreams become a direct and powerful force in themselves.

A fascinating mix of autobiographical episodes and extraordinary Egyptian theology, Burroughs's final novel is poignant and melancholic. Blending war films and pornography, and referencing Kafka and Mailer, The Western Lands confirms his status as one of America's greatest writers. The final novel of the trilogy containing Cities of the Red Night and The Place of Dead Roads, this is a profound meditation on morality, loneliness, life and death.

An opium addict is lost in the jungle; young men wage war against an empire of mutants; a handsome young pirate faces his execution; and the world's population is infected with a radioactive epidemic. These stories are woven together in a single tale of mayhem and chaos. In the first novel of the trilogy continued in The Place of Dead Roads and The Western Lands, William Burroughs sharply satirizes modern society in a poetic and shocking story of sex, drugs, disease and adventure.