William Burroughs: Junky (1953) and Naked Lunch (1959)

Agenda for analysis:

 

 

Narration:                  1st person point of view (usually omniscient)

                                   Involved narrator

                                   Narrative irony

                                   Reliability, exaggeration/hyperbole

                                   

Stylistics/Diction:       Cut Up

                                   Slang, argot

                                   Repetition

                                   Sardonic tone

 

Thematics:                  Junk/Scoring

                                   Marks/Narcs/Hustling

                                   

Themes                      Addiction

                                   Power

                                   Sex (Queer)

                                   Crime

                                   Identity (fluid)

                                   Community (unstable)

 

Genre:                        Autobiography, confession

                                   Novel

                                   Manifesto/document

 

Contexts:                    Experimental literature/Avantgarde

                                   Bohemianism

                                   Intertextuality/Parody

                                   Cult status/imitation

 

Ideas for essays:

 

William Burroughs: Junky (1953) and Naked Lunch (1959)

 

Consider the use of first person narration in Burroughs’ books. Is he writing autobiographically, or even confessionally? Discuss how this fits in with the use of ‘routines’ in Naked Lunch where Burroughs seems to be role playing and creating alter egos that often morph into new strange characters that barely seem human.

 

Characterize Burroughs’ prose style.

[Laconic, terse, dead-pan, affectless, alternately sober and hyperbolic, fabulating, fantastic, Cut Up]

What is the overall effect on the reader of this mixture of styles and techniques?

 

Consider Burroughs’ use of setting: US locales versus exotic elsewheres, interzones, etc.

 

Consider Burroughs’ selection of scenes and the arrangement of them in sequences, or rather non-sequentially. What is the effect of muddling temporal and causal logic?

 

Burroughs’ central themes could be said to be addiction in all its forms, and the use and abuse of power in all its forms. Discuss the thematic complexes of addiction and power in one or several of his prose texts.