Queer

by William S. Burroughs, Teresa Tyszowiecka-Tarkowska (Translator)

Queer to powieść-wyznanie. Opowieść o pożądaniu, samotności i ciemnych zakamarkach ludzkiej duszy — teraz w nowym przekładzie Teresy Tyszowieckiej.

Napisany w 1952 roku, lecz przez dekady ukrywany przed światem, Queer to najbardziej osobista, a zarazem najbardziej niedopowiedziana powieść Williama S. Burroughsa. Osadzona w dusznym Meksyku lat pięćdziesiątych, śledzi losy Williama Lee — alter ego autora — który, błądząc od baru do baru wśród amerykańskich emigrantów, goni widmo namiętności, balansując na granicy obsesji i rozpaczy.

To jedyna w jego twórczości realistyczna historia miłosna, ale też gorzka, pełna groteski refleksja nad tożsamością, pragnieniem i odrzuceniem. W Queer wybrzmiewa ten sam szorstki, bezkompromisowy głos, który uczynił z „Nagiego lunchu” literacki przełom — mieszanka autoironii, maniakalnego humoru i ostrej krytyki amerykańskiej mitologii. Jedno z najbardziej poruszających świadectw outsiderstwa XX wieku.

Genres: Fiction, Queer, Classics, LGBT, American, Novels, Gay

192 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 1985

About the author

William Seward Burroughs II, (also known by his pen name William Lee) was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, painter, and spoken word performer.
A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author, he is considered to be "one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th century".
His influence is considered to have affected a range of popular culture as well as literature. Burroughs wrote 18 novels and novellas, six collections of short stories and four collections of essays.
Five books have been published of his interviews and correspondences. He also collaborated on projects and recordings with numerous performers and musicians, and made many appearances in films.
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 dropped out and became afflicted with 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 what became the countercultural movement of the Beat Generation.
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. 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. Jack Kerouac called Burroughs the "greatest satirical writer since Jonathan Swift", a reputation he owes to his "lifelong subversion" 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".
Burroughs had one child, William Seward Burroughs III (1947-1981), with his second wife Joan Vollmer. Vollmer died in 1951 in Mexico City. Burroughs was convicted of manslaughter in Vollmer's death, an event that deeply permeated all of his writings. Burroughs died at his home in Lawrence, Kansas, after suffering a heart attack in 1997.

Reviews

[Kristen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have a passionate hatred for William Burroughs. I think even his fans have to concede that he's a degenerate piece of shit. I admit my prior experience with him consists of 5 pages of Naked Lunch and a couple biographies of various sorts, none of which fail to mention the pedophilia and him murdering his wife (I'm from Detroit, don't think for a second I buy his bullshit story), not that I'd hold that against him when rating this book.

I went into this book expecting it to be about heroin abuse and gay sex, you know some fun light reading, instead it turns about to be a sober, heartbreaking tale of profound universal human loneliness: "In deep sadness there is no place for sentimentality. It is as the mountains: a fact. There it is. When you realize it, you cannot complain."

The fact that this book is great somehow only makes me hate him more.





---------------------------------------------------------------------
Alright Burroughs, I don't like you and you don't like me, but I found this for .50 cents today so I'm giving you one more shot to redeem yourself . . . Don't Fuck This Up!

[Joshua Nomen-Mutatio · Rating 3 out of 5]

Here's the thing that puzzles me about this book: why was it not published until 1985 while the far, far more offensive Naked Lunch was published (not without obstacles) in 1959? One idea is that Burroughs put the manuscript for Queer away for many years and chose not to revisit it because it reminded him of a extremely terrible time in his life, the time surrounding the well-known (and unfortunately adapted to the screen) accidental killing of his wife during a drunken game of William Tell (a "parlor trick" which primarily involves shooting objects off of a person's head with a gun). He goes into some detail about this emotional difficulty in the fairly remarkable introduction written in the aforementioned year of the book’s long overdue publication.

There isn’t a single description in this book that could be considered sexually explicit, homosexual or otherwise. Apparently even the slightest allusion to homosexuality while failing to regard it as a immoral, objectionable or otherwise contemptible aspect of existence was enough to prevent the book from being published, yet, Naked Lunch is immeasurably more graphic and unsettling in every dimension than Queer. So it seems that this book must have gone unpublished for 30 plus years solely due to Burroughs need to keep it hidden from himself.

So the book is a sequel to Burroughs’ novelistic debut Junky and both are quite autobiographical. To put it simply Lee is William S. Burroughs. According to some brief research Eugene Allerton is also based on a real person:

"Adelbert Lewis Marker (1930-1998), a recently discharged American Navy serviceman from Jacksonville, Florida who befriended Burroughs in Mexico City" (source). This can be affirmed through a read of Letters to Allen Ginsberg, 1953-1957.

The plot is rather simple. Lee is trying to kick a heroin habit while on the lam in Mexico City. He’s avoiding Stateside drug charges until the 5 year statute of limitations is reached. He’s wandering around, drinking alcohol constantly and looking for some properly satisfying sex with men, specifically his eyes latch onto Eugene Allerton. As a brief aside here, let me say that some of the very concise descriptions of extreme lust are really well done. Though I don't identify with the specific objectives of Burroughs' lust (i.e. wishing to be "had" by and to "have" a flock of adolescent Ecuadorian boys in a muddy riverbed, etc) nonetheless lust is lust is lust is lust. Ok, so this Allerton fella is sort of queer--"obliging" is how Burroughs puts it. He's willing to have sex with men but not all that into it. That sorta thing. Their relationship doesn’t stray much from this basic dynamic.

Eventually Lee sets up a sex-for-money deal which includes (in addition to sexual demands being met at least twice a week) that Allerton is to accompany him on trip to Ecuador in search of "Yage" (a.k.a. ayahuasca), a plant Lee believes to possess telepathy-inducing properties. He believes that the Russians and Americans are trying to extract these telepathic powers from the plant for obvious, ethically dubious, authoritarian intentions (i.e. mind-control en masse). However all Lee wants it for is so that he can make pretty boys in the street and Allerton himself his sexual slaves. So he no longer has to deal with all of the socio-psychological annoyances that come with being a sex seeking gay male in the 1950’s. Lee talking to Allerton:

"While we are in Ecuador we must score for Yage," Lee said. "Think of it: thought control. Take anyone apart and rebuild to your taste. Anything about somebody bugs you, you say, 'Yage! I want that routine took clear out of his mind.' I could think of a few changes I might make in you, doll." He looked at Allerton and licked his lips. "You'd be so much nicer after a few alterations. You're nice now but you do have those irritating peculiarities. I mean, you won't do exactly what I want you to do all the time."

I enjoyed the book for three basic reasons (in no particular order):

1) The descriptions of Mexico City and various towns within Ecuador during the late 40’s/early 50’s for their cultural and historical value.

2) The expression of what kind of psychological pains faced a homosexual in the not so distant past due to the obvious massive intolerance and condemnation of such people. The word "queer" began as a pejorative term for homosexuals. Burroughs is writing during a time when this was still the case, before people had reappropriated the term and also before the word "gay" was also reappropriated to put a more positive spin on what it means to be a homosexual. I found this basic reason for enjoying the book to also bring about the only real feelings of empathy for cranky and often cruel and morbid ol’ Lee.

He felt a killing hate for the stupid, ordinary, disapproving people who kept him from doing what he wanted to do. "Someday I am going to have things just like I want," he said to himself. "And if any moralizing son of a bitch gives me any static, they will fish him out of the river."

It got me thinking about how truly unfortunate it is that homosexuals were—and still are in many socio-cultural contexts—forced to hide their sexuality, to develop the most ugly of self-conceptions, to fear for their lives all due to a hatred and prejudice that has no defensible, rational basis whatsoever. On a lighter note, it also made me feel an appreciation for the progress that has been made throughout the world to combat this irrationally-based prejudice. Though gays are still executed simply for being gay in Iran and other nations, in most western countries things have improved greatly for homosexuals.

3) Identifying the seedlings of what would eventually become the style of "classic Burroughs." Most of the novel is fairly straight ahead third-person narrative but a few bizarre Naked Lunch -like descriptions flash upon the page once and a while, mostly during what are known as Lee’s "routines." These "routines" are Lee’s oft-intoxicated rambling bar-side orations. For example we come to this monologue (voiced to no one in particular) in the midst of fairly normal third-person description of Lee shadowing his current sexual interest Eugene Allerton who is leaving the bar with a woman named Mary:

"Sometimes he [an Italian chess master] used smoke screens to hide his maneuvers from the opposition—I mean literal smoke screens, of course. He had corps of trained idiots who would rush in at a given signal and eat all the pieces. With defeat staring him in the face—as it often did, because actually he knew nothing of chess but the rules and wasn’t too sure of those—he would leap up yelling, 'You cheap bastard! I saw you palm that queen!' and ram a broken teacup into his opponent’s face. In 1922 he was rid out of Prague on a rail. The next time I saw Tetrazzini [the "Italian chess master":] was in Upper Ubangi. A complete wreck. Peddling unlicensed condoms. That was the year of rinderpest, when everything died, even the hyenas."

[Orsodimondo · Rating 4 out of 5]

WILD BOY AND THE SPIDER FROM MARS


Un lettore di Burroughs aspetta la metro.

Il secondo romanzo di Burroughs (1952), ma rimasto manoscritto almeno per trent’anni finché non fu pubblicato nel 1985.
La prima uscita italiana ha titolo più discreto, Diverso, ma poi l’originale Queer verrà invece tradotto con Checca (Adelphi).

Il protagonista ritorna dal suo primo romanzo, Junky: è il suo alter ego, William Lee. Anche se lì narrava in prima persona, qui invece è raccontato da narratore esterno, in terza persona.

Ambientato a Città del Mexico, dove Burroughs visse negli anni Quaranta, è accompagnato da una ghiotta e gustosa lunga introduzione firmata dallo stesso Burroughs che da sola merita la lettura.


William S. Burroughs cerca di abbattere le Twin Towers nel 1978.

Siamo ancora lontani dalla sua tecnica di scrittura sperimentale, il cut-up, siamo ancora nel solco di una narrativa più tradizionale.
Ma l’occhio, l’acume, l’ironia, il gusto eccentrico, il senso tossico sono quelli del miglior Burroughs.

La scimmia sulla schiena è blanda, Bill (William) Lee non ha crisi di astinenza, quando le ha sono meno forti, riesce a controllarle con alcol ed erba. Sono quindi assenti allucinazioni lisergiche, che in qualche modo Burroughs sostituisce con i sogni: i momenti in cui ci racconta i sogni di William Lee sono chiaramente quelli più visionari e distorti.


Sulla spiaggia di Tangeri, da sin a dx: Peter Orlovsky, Jack Kerouac e sdraiato William Burroughs, che in Marocco era soprannominato “l’uomo invisibile”, forse per la sua magrezza, forse per il livello tossico che lo portava a scomparire.

Questa volta predomina l’omosessualità, che Burroughs non ha mai nascosto, tutt’altro, e che non gli ha impedito di sposarsi due volte e avere figli, finché la seconda moglie rimase uccisa, si dice per errore o casualità, mentre lo scrittore si esercitava al tiro a segno con la sua Colt (Guglielmo Tell docet) e questo secondo romanzo sarebbe scritto molto sull’onda del senso di colpa (mica si avverte granché, ma forse io sono un lettore cinico, foderato).

Il più adulto (e maturo) William Lee passa il suo tempo (e quello di questo breve romanzo) corteggiando e tampinando il più giovane Gene (Eugene) Allerton, altro americano approdato in Mexico per fare esperienza e godersi la vita con due dollari al giorno.
Lee a tratti prova un desiderio così intenso del contatto col corpo del giovane da avvertire dolore fisico, una forma più blanda di scimmia sulla schiena, di astinenza:
Sentiva una profonda ferita, come se dentro stesse sanguinando. Sul volto gli scorrevano le lacrime.
E in effetti i due momenti, il desiderio sessuale e l’astinenza, sembrano essere molto simili, altrettanto dilanianti.


Ancora Burroughs insieme a Kerouac.

Allerton un po’ ci sta, ma presto si sente soffocare, sente di perdere la sua libertà e indipendenza sotto la pressione del desiderio di Lee, e preferisce passare la notte con le señoritas.
Lee escogita un viaggio in Sud America, Quito, ma soprattutto l’Amazzonia alla ricerca del mitico yage, la droga naturale che dovrebbe generare la telepatia.

Abbondantemente autobiografico, sia per la permanenza in Mexico (dove scappò in attesa che un'accusa di possesso di marijuana che pendeva sul suo capo negli Stati Uniti andasse in prescrizione, e dove finì per restare diversi anni), sia per i viaggi alla ricerca delle droghe “naturali”, sia per l’omosessualità che la dipendenza.

Anni fa è stato annunciato che Steve Buscemi avrebbe diretto il film, che sarebbe stato interpretato da Guy Pearce e Ben Foster: ma così non è stato, è rimasto un progetto irrealizzato.


Wild Boy and The Spider From Mars

[mina reads™️ · Rating 2 out of 5]

A raging racist, pedophile meditates on fuck all for 200 pages but his perverse fantasies about children, new ways to insult racial minorities and brief bouts of disappointment that his hired twink companion isn’t a rapt enough audience.

The film was better by every metric and the sheer deplorable nature of Lee’s spirit was made empathetic and heartbreaking by Daniel Craig’s performance and Luca Guadagnino’s camera lens. The film also added layers to the Allerton/Lee connection that I found far more compelling than the novel. This book left me pretty cold and unimpressed for the most part. Some decent turns of phrase here or there but nothing overly impressive to me.

[N · Rating 5 out of 5]

"In deep sadness there is no place for sentimentality. It is as final as the mountains: a fact, there it is. When you realize it, you cannot complain" (Burroughs 84).

William S. Burroughs' "Queer" was a heartrending reading experience. It is for those who love stories of heartbreak, of desire, of the need to connect. Surreal and poetic, lush and blunt- it is a novel for those who are brave enough to face heartache over and over again.

It's the love story between protagonist William Lee and Eugene Allerton. Lee is a bundle of neuroses. A man looking for love, looking for intellectual and spiritual connections. But a man whose addiction to heroin caused him to leave America during the 1950s, and become exiled in Mexico City. There he meets the enigmatic and aloof Allerton, who seems to be detached in his feelings, and of his sexuality.

Both Lee and Allerton seem to embody the feeling of self loathing in their homosexuality, although Lee is the one who declares his self-hatred much more openly, "I shall never forget the unspeakable horror that froze the lymph in glands--when the baneful word seared my reeling brain, homosexual. I thought of the painted, simpering female impersonators I had seen in a Baltimore night club" (35). The desire to hide oneself under the guise of stereotypical, male masculinity is understandable- of course, who wouldn't want to fit in? Who would want to be rejected?

This sentence still rings true today, in which there are still LGBTQ members who fight society's desire to conform to heteronormativity, yet, would simply want to find love.

Lee and Allerton end up going down to the rain forests of Puyo, Ecuador to experience the yage- a plant that allows telepathy between two people who experience it's scent, and of its power. Lee especially wants this, he wants to connect with the man he's been in love with for some time, and without the fear of rejection.

He wants to know what Allerton's feeling, thinking, and loving any given moment. They meet Dr. and Mrs. Cotter who introduce them to the plant in the jungle, "Lee felt a physical pain, as though a part of himself tentatively stretched out toward the other had been severed" (50).

Burroughs writes a haunting tale of desire and love that cuts like glass, "Lee could feel his body pull towards Allerton...straining with a blind worm hunger to enter the other's body, to breathe with his lungs, see with his eyes, learn the feel of his viscera and genitals" (33).

He writes about loneliness and the hunger of desire with a rawness that is exquisite and vulnerable, a narrative with its heart on its sleeve that any risk becomes secondary- the need to connect is too powerful, something that must be sought out, with a disregard for any rules or limits.

This book rivals my reading experiences of Andre Aciman's "Call Me By Your Name", "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter" by Carson McCullers, and "Giovanni's Room" by James Baldwin as gay sensory reading experiences that burns and aches with emotion while being read.

It's no coincidence that filmmaker Luca Guadagnino who directed the immortal film adaptation of Aciman's "Call Me By Your Name" directed Burroughs' novel in 2024 starring Daniel Craig as Lee and Drew Starkey as Allerton. He is a master of capturing the erotic desire that gay men often feel in spaces that are forbidden. I read this book because I saw the film adaptation first.

While the film had a lot of moments that borders into self indulgence, Daniel Craig gives a powerful, imperious and heartbreakingly human performance as Lee. His gestures of sadness flickering with both mischief and desire capture the Lee Burroughs has written. Drew Starkey compliments his performance as the aloof, yet tenderhearted Allerton, who seems to love Lee a lot more than he realizes.

With lush, gorgeous production designs that capture both the beautiful and the sleazy- it's a surreal film that captures the essence of the novel, yet, its very own uneven thing.

[mark monday · Rating 2 out of 5]

seriously, Lee, will you give it a rest? stop trying to get into the pants of that straight guy. get some dignity. try getting into the pants of some dignity! Lee, i hate to tell you this, but you are embarrassing yourself. you're desperate and that is highly unattractive. even worse, you surround yourself with the same decay that is present in your decayed view of the world. and when that isn't enough, you seek out even more decay, until the novel becomes a travelogue of depressing decay, decay, decay. all the while trying pathetically to suck the dick of some serviceman who actually is neither your friend nor queer. you give queers a bad name! and so i resent even the title of this novel of your boring misadventures. you are as bad as some drunk straight guy at a party who is so wasted that he doesn't even know that the girl he is hitting on so sloppily is rolling her eyes at him in boredom and disgust. No Means No!

however, Queer, you do get 1 extra star because you may serve as a somewhat easy entry point into the writing of william s. burroughs, who went on to write so much that was greater. and, well, the writing in this one isn't really bad at all. it is the story that revolts; the writing is on the interesting side of really-not-bad-at-all.

[MJ Nicholls · Rating 4 out of 5]

Certain “cult” writing earns this status because the prose is so transparent and simple it instantly appeals to teenage males done with Easton Ellis and Kerouac who want to up their shock quotient before attempting to read Gravity’s Rainbow for the first and last time. Queer fits the bill except, by today’s standards, the book is a little prude in tight Speedos with its danglies between its thighs asking us to love it if we’d only give it a chance. Will Lee is a homosexual-in-training in pursuit of reluctant, disobliging ass that often makes him cry, so unsure is he of his own sexuality. This is a weird piece of tortuousness. But an interesting one.

[Meike · Rating 4 out of 5]

Now a Movie with Daniel Craig as Burroughs' Alter Ego
Written in the early 50's, this novel was only published in 1985, because of its scandalous content which, by today's standards, is ... not really all that scandalous. There is almost nothing shocking here, just WSB's literary alter ego William Lee (see Junky, Naked Lunch etc.) doing his Beat thing - roaming around, hanging out in Mexico, spending time in sleazy bars with sleazy characters - and desperately falling for a young man named Allerton, a fictionalized version of Burroughs' real life love interest Adelbert Lewis Marker.

While in its precursor Junky, Lee is fully overtaken by the algebra of need, i.e. the need for junk, a substance that insulates him from his feelings, he is now off the junk and dominated by desire (not so fun fact: When Burroughs' fictionalized and wrote down this episode of his life, he was back on the junk again). Lee is longing for Allerton, and it's hard to witness what he is willing to do to ensure his presence and sexual attention. But shocking or graphic it is not.

When read in the context of Naked Lunch, the novel is interesting for its use of "routines", so behavioral, verbal and narrative patterns that Burroughs takes to the extreme in its experimental masterpiece in order to illustrate the extreme structure addiction enforces on the individual as opposed to the cliche of chasing freedom in drugs. In "Queer", these routines manifest as compulsive behaviors driven by desire, so it's the manic desire that to a degree replaces the obsession with junk.

The more Burroughs I read, the more intrigued I become.

[Henk · Rating 3 out of 5]

The sadness of desiring someone who doesn’t love you, with a lot of drugs in the Andes thrown into the mix
Sodomy is as old as the human species

Read in advance of Luca Guadagnino his adaptation, featuring Daniel “James Bond” Craig, which I found interesting but not adding much to the slight “story”: https://youtu.be/teD48Kt6FMk?si=Ng_Mc...

I am always a bit hesitant in respect to books that start of with a major scholarly essays (sometimes these tell you everything about the plot, making reading kind of a guard railed experience), and the edition of Queer I read has almost more pages than the slim story itself. I did learn a lot about the background of William S. Burroughs and how closely his books draw on his personal history.

In this book we have the authors alter ego, William Lee, who lives a vapid expat life in Mexico and tries to get into the pants of many boys, settling for the handsome but distant Allerton in the end, who doesn’t love him back, but enjoys his financial support. A tale as old as time in a sense (which makes this statement of Lee more hilarious: Thank god, Lee thought, I don’t need to contend with middle class morality), just with ayahuasca, cocaine, heroine and marijuana in the Andes as a distinguishing feature.
There is a weird doctor who in a by Shell depopulated jungle tries to extract poison from Indian arrowheads, but to be fair not much special happens. In terms of masculine "blokeyness" and spareness I would liken the narrative voice a bit to Ernest Hemingway.

A lot of the events that could give Lee more background happen "off screen" to the novel, as the author himself explains in the afterword. Not just the shooting of a spouse, but also withdrawal from drugs and becoming a more normal human with sexual desires again, drive the plot in a sense. Interesting as well how the G.I. bill let people just take their money abroad and live comfortably there.
I would say this is rather an impressionistic novel, which maybe helps explains why it is popular to adapt onto the screen as the director can project freely. Even though during the 50s the subject was highly taboo, there is not much for a current day reader to find here that really shocks (besides the tale being quite racist, and the Americans in Mexico not engaging at all with the local culture).

The 2024 film is quite hermetic, if beautiful at times set into the time, but in both mediums I expected more upfront.

[MissBecka Gee · Rating 5 out of 5]

My love affair with Burroughs started at a young age due (mostly) to this book.
This is one of my all time favourite books and has lost nothing with time.
I like to think of this as one of the greatest beat era love stories, that isn't a love story.

[james · Rating 2 out of 5]

welcome to 202-Queer 🌈✨

50 in February: 39/50


not me complaining about the long ass introduction for one hour straight when it was actually the most interesting part of the book (⁠ ⁠ꈍ⁠ᴗ⁠ꈍ⁠)

[Djali · Rating 3 out of 5]

“Non dimenticherò mai l’inenarrabile orrore che mi raggelò la linfa nelle ghiandole – le linfoghiandole, intendo – quando quella parola perniciosa lasciò un marchio a fuoco sul mio cervello vacillante: omosessuale. Ero un omosessuale. Pensai ai travestiti imbellettati e smorfiosi che avevo visto in un night-club di Baltimora. Era davvero possibile che io fossi una di quelle creature subumane? Camminai per le strade in stato confusionale, come uno con una leggera commozione cerebrale – ancora un minuto, dottor Kildare, questo non è il suo copione. Potevo suicidarmi, mettere fine a un’esistenza che sembrava avere in serbo per me soltanto un’infelicità grottesca e umiliante. Più nobile, pensai, morire da uomo che continuare a vivere da mostro sessuale. Fu una checca vecchia e saggia – Bobo, la chiamavamo – a insegnarmi che avevo il dovere di vivere portando con fierezza il mio fardello sotto gli occhi del mondo, di vincere il pregiudizio e l’ignoranza e l’odio con la consapevolezza, la sincerità e l’amore. Ogni qualvolta vieni minacciato da una presenza ostile, tu emetti una densa nube d’amore come un calamaro schizza inchiostro.”

Lee suscita una smisurata tenerezza nel lettore: alla costante ricerca di attenzione da parte di persone che, già lo sa, se lo tengono vicino per puro tornaconto; bisognoso e desideroso di amore ma con la paura di disturbare tipica di chi è abituato ad elemosinare l’affetto, è un personaggio che rimane nel cuore.

[enzoreads · Rating 2 out of 5]

ok

[L.A. Witt · Rating 1 out of 5]

I tried. I effing tried.

I can appreciate the book for what it is. Publishing (even writing) a queer-themed book was daring and subversive in that era. Living that life was dangerous. So in that respect, I can appreciate it for breaking ground, etc.

That said, I hated the book. Or I should say, I hated the half of the book I managed to get through before I finally gave up because...I hated it. Lee is obnoxious, judgmental, entitled, and at times downright creepy in his pursuit of Eugene. I don't expect characters to be sympathetic all the time (in fact, I rather enjoy anti-heroes), but for God's sake, they need to be INTERESTING. Lee was about as fascinating as a teenager fixating on the rock star they're determined to marry, regardless of what that rock star thinks of the idea.

DNF.

[Vika · Rating 5 out of 5]

his swagless looks and cringe fail personality have captivated me

[George Ilsley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Burroughs used the evocative word "Queer" when the word was mostly a pejorative. In that alone, he was decades ahead of the times. He wrote about things which were unmentionable and supposedly unpublishable, and built a career around saying things which were not to be mentioned. The unsuccessful prosecution of his novel "Naked Lunch" for obscenity changed the censorship laws in the U.S. To the very end of his long life, Burroughs' disdain for the so-called "polite society" was an incredibly motivating force in his life.

[Gerhard · Rating 4 out of 5]

'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.'

A real hot mess of a half-baked novel, but weirdly one of Burroughs' most lucid and sexually frank works. Definitely a fragment of a novel, hence it being consigned to literary purgatory until 1985. Burroughs 'new' 1985 intro reads as disingenuous, framing 'Queer' as an apologia for his wife's death at his own hand in a shooting incident. 'Queer' is so much more than that; I am sure the upcoming Guadagnino adaptation will do full justice to its mesmerising, provocative power.

[Lui · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was my first contact with William S. Burroughs and probably my last. I went into this book with an open mind, I had been warned that it depicted controversial topics. I'm very curious, especially when it comes to books, I like things that can be seen as controversial, but this is just a book bragging about the author's crimes and how being in a "3rd World Country" made it easier.

At first, it's a strange read: I had a feeling I was missing several parts of the story to understand it (I knew there was Junky that came first, but I chose to read Queer as a stand alone since it will inspire Luca Guadagnino's next film), that feeling didn't dissipate throughout the book, but once you were acquainted with some names it was tolerable.

The language used and the prejudiced comparisons was expected, since it was written in the 1940s, and I wasn't surprised by it's controversies until the middle of this short book. The last chapters were a drag to read, the only highlight being the journey with Lee and Allerton to find Ayahuasca, but that entertaining narrative is destroyed by a graphic depiction of Lee raping a 12-year-old boy on the street in plain daylight and bragging about it to Allerton later.

The overall feeling to me is that this book is a bunch of stories stuck together with tape, made to highlight the depraved life of the author, who used everyone as he pleased and got away with everything. He wasn't even satisfied with all the damage he'd done: he fantasized about an even more depraved life than he had already lived.

I was surprised to see the positive reviews here, even though they pinpointed that they hated the author, they loved this specific book. To me, his writing isn't touching in any way or even entertaining, it feels pointless.

[gabrielle]

i’m studying. reading the luca guadagnino texts.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although I struggled with the plot and lack of characterisation, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for Lee at times as he longed for some sort of physical contact/connection. It wasn’t awful, but I preferred Junky.

[Joey · Rating 3 out of 5]

A conservative reader might ask his Goodreads friends , “ Is William Burroughs gay? “ as if Burrough knows how it feels like being queer, an offensive slang for homosexual. If he is, it is neither here nor there because he is able to depict the reality of the homosexual world , categorically, the desire to establish an intimate relationship with a straight guy. So if you are gay, you might be able to empathize the situation of the protagonist. But if you are a straight guy, you might end up realizing that not all gays are “ lecherously fellatioes” by nature. They are not far different from “coquettishly fellatrixes” .(laughs )


The book depicts the life of the queer , particularly how they get into an intimate relationship with the same sex. In the story, although not quite clear , the protagonist, Lee wants to build an intimate relationship with Allerton. The story is not clear if he is a straight guy, but the story says that he does not like to make friends with a queer. Eventually, Lee and Allerton becomes friends since Lee is determined to get along with him. They spend time together in the same bed. Again , the story is not quite clear if they make love, for Allerton does not want Lee to keep on touching him. In effect, Lee has secret sexual desire for Allerton; however, he has fear to get in on the act, for Allerton appears to be a straight guy.

If you are a queer, you may be able to empathize with the deeper side of Lee. But admit it. This is the fact to some extent that queers’ real intention whenever they make friends with a guy is to build an intimate relationship. No wonder that the common perception of guys is that queers are cock-suckers. (laughs) But not all queers have this kind of sexual behavior pattern. As a matter of fact, such queers are not far different from coquettish women. People are not just used to this kind of sexual human evolution.

In the Philippines, queers appear to be divided into four categories : they are closet gays, open gays, transvestites, and the transgendered. Closet gays are known as peppermint or paminta in Filipino because they are bound to get pulverized to come out in the open. Open gays appear to be naïve , but still they are known for their effeminate mannerisms unlike transvestites and the transgendered for their flamboyantly feministic fashion. The latter three kinds of gays are likely to be socially accepted because they are more open to their self-identities (despite the fact that the atmosphere is not yet completely conducive. )However, peppermints have a hard time; consequently, they face different dilemmas.

It is my first William Burroughs’s novel. Whenever I thumbed it through on my list, I always wondered why its title is Queer since its paperback picture looks immaterial. When I got the chance to read it, I got Burroughs’s method to his madness: internalizing queers’ feelings.
For this reason, impressed by his unique twist of writing, I heard that his critically acclaimed NAKED LUNCH is a good read. I will buy it at any cost as soon as I spot it. ^^

[Tal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lee, Chapter 4: "Got an idea for a new dish. Take a live pig and throw it into a very hot oven so the pig is roasted outside and when you cut into it, it's still alive and twitching inside. Or, if we run a dramatic joint, a screaming pig covered with burning brandy rushes out of the kitchen and dies right by your chair. You can reach down and pull off the crispy, crackly ears and eat them with your cocktails."

Junky is tougher, and Naked Lunch is weirder, but this is the best Burroughs' book I've read yet. Light, touching, funny, yet dangerous, Queer isn't cuffed by the terse factual allegiance of Junky or the unchecked typhoon of spazz that makes Naked Lunch a slight disappointment. Instead we have sympathy for the devil, cringing for the maladroit, and a fascination for a man who was neither social butterfly nor parasite, but a bizarre insect somewhere in the middle.

[Caitlin · Rating 5 out of 5]

The tone was relaxed yet captivating and I can see myself rereading it to see what I get from it a second time. In fact, some passages were so lovely that I reread them several times before continuing.

[Matt Piechocinski · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think the title of this book is a bit of a misnomer, and it appeals to everyone, regardless of sexuality. Why? Because everyone has been in the situation where they find themselves pining over, or maybe even loving someone, who doesn't reciprocate emotionally. The fact that Burroughs is gay, is irrelevent, because the hurt and sadness is real, and everyone has felt it. I found myself really identifying with Lee in this way, more so than I could in Junkie ... and Allerton read like a Bret Easton Ellis character, but really representative of the type of guy my gay friends complain about on the dating scene ... shallow, vapid, and only into himself. Good book.

[Hristina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Un fel de exorcizare a unui demon care se regenereaza la infinit, una pe cât de tristă pe atat de jalnică. O minte lucidă care nu folosește decât la condimentarea unui pustiu afectiv. Borroughs ar fi reconfigurat lumea, unidimensional, cu un singur scop și o singură rațiune, aceea de a fi iubit. La fel de unidimensional este și romanul, e ca un instrument cu o singură coardă care cântă acelasi lucru de la început până la sfârșit, o litanie, balada unui gay obscur în căutarea unei himere. Nimic mai bun în roman decât introducerea, nici un regret că l-am citit.

[Leo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought the audiobook of this was good although I didn't like that it took so long for the actual book to start with it having an intro. I don't like that in my audiobook and I have to admit I didn't listen to that part very carefully. While reading some reviews on this book I realized I might need to do some research on William S Burroughs as I don't know anything about him except from the books I've read by him

[nathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

"𝘕𝘰 𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 𝘢𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘦. 𝘠𝘰𝘶 𝘢𝘳𝘦 ���𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘭𝘪𝘷𝘦. 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘧𝘧𝘪𝘤𝘶𝘭𝘵𝘺 𝘪𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘷𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘦𝘭𝘴𝘦 𝘩𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘺𝘰𝘶, 𝘴𝘰 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘩𝘦𝘭𝘭? 𝘜𝘴 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘴 𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘵𝘰 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘬 𝘵𝘰𝘨𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳."

All I know Burroughs to be: dirty, grimy, unforgiving.

Works itself out more like a travelogue of a globethotter than actual narrative as we get boys and men, left and right, that swirl in drunk passes, high thoughts, seeking out primal urges with primitive appetites. At the core of a gay man is a lonely animal, caged by bone and hunkered down by rotting flesh. Sometimes we feel a waste to what we can be or want to be in an America that fears us, hates us, especially for Burroughs in his time. It makes sense that he left to Mexico. It makes sense that you go off to a faraway place to create conclusions of your own body.

The travelogue is haphazardly put together by loose dialogue and a hungry eye, perhaps to lean focus into the carnival-esque high of heroin. Its ups, downs, and buzzes in between. It loops hedonism into a tight tourniquet, wanting life to burst at its seams into something stronger. But in the end, there is very little. A big nothing.

Perhaps this will be better in Luca Guadagnino's hands, whose attention to detail and care always rings true in atmosphere and character.

[Momčilo Žunić]

Rani Barouz koji se ovde natapa u tematskim značajkama bitničke poetike (skitalaštvo i gluvarenje, alkoholisanje, narkofilija i seksualno oslobađanje) predstavlja glavnog junaka Vilijama Lija (u neku ruku Barouzovo ispovedno JA prebačeno disekcije radi u 3. lice) kao samosvojnu usamljenost koja u nedostatku bliskosti vreme traći na isprazna ćeretanja, površna prijateljstva, iritaciju u međuljudskim odnosima, na smucanje i lutanje (koje, eh, nikad nije samo fizičko), u iščekivanju najposle onoga što je prevedeno kao "kontakt".*

*Svagda bih pre birao i pisao ovu leksemu kao dodir ili doticaj, jer u ovoj odabranoj iznalazim nešto što štekta i odbija se poput lopte.

Epizodično-nemarno pripovedanje, delimice nenamešteno, improvizovano i neobavezujuće,** delimice izravno i površinsko - doduše ne i toliko koliko se u prvi mah čini da je površno - ospoljena je projekcija haosa junaka koji je "u potpunosti nesiguran u sebe i u ono što želi" i koji, stojeći u senci, u drugome, dakle, onome čija se bliskost priziva, vidi "kez neskrivene pohote... [sopstvenog] uskraćenog bića", ali i nemoć da se istodobno ostvari dvosmerna (recipročna) telepatičnost i(li) neverbalizovana intuitivnost. Li se i samozavarava i ogoljava u nečemu i kroz nešto što je od početka pogrešno ili što, štaviše, ne postoji. Otud se "Queer" čita kao antiromansa, odnosno kao desentimentalizovani narativ. Na stranu s problematičnom i problematizovanom homoseksualnom vezom, kvir kao ono što je prvobitno stajalo i što je opstalo u kadru, zrcalo je za Lijevu vlastitu drugačijost*** koja će - čitano i u autobiografskom ključu odskakati u odnosu na svaku etiketu, pa i onu homoseksualnu, iako se ovde transparentno njome deklariše - morati da ostane sama.

**U naglo zasečenom završetku, čini se da je "Queer" pisan terapeutski ili onoliko koliko je to autoru bilo potrebno, ili, da je kasnije Barouz bio nemoćan da mu se vrati i da ga popravlja. Nameštenost bi tako bila umivenost do koje se ne drži.

***Ispoljenja takve različitosti treba tražiti u ciničko-kozerskim dosetkama i fristajlovima, osobenim polit-nekorektnim stajalištima (izgledno je da se podjednako hejtuju svi) i protivrečnim izborima i postupcima.

P.S. Goli je fakticitet, naposletku, da, očigledno prestareo za bitničarenje i zagladneo za nekom manje sirovom "ajahuaskom", prvotnog Barouza ne bih ni bio pročitao da nije bilo Gvadanjinovog filma. A on je čista amerikana u pogledu uprizorenja Meksiko Sitija, ali je sproću i seksualno eksplicitniji i nudi zaokruženiju, ali i unekoliko polupatetizovaniju priču.

[Mindy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have wanted to read Burroughs for a while and was going to start with Naked Lunch, but I kept hearing mixed opinions, so I continued to push it to the back of my TBR. Then I came across this thin novel at a used bookstore and figured this was a good place to start. Not only did I enjoy the novel, I loved that Burroughs had written the introduction. Queer was written in 1949, but wasn't published until 1985. Burroughs explains the reasons behind this and other info. that was fascinating. I'm a big fan of the style of writing where it's fiction but you know the author is writing about themselves and their experiences. So this novel was right in my wheelhouse. Can't wait to read more of Burroughs' work.

[E · Rating 1 out of 5]

This might actually be worse than the time Burroughs shot his wife