Queer

Written by William S. Burroughs

Narrated by Andrew Garman, Multiple Narrators and T. Ryder Smith

Originally written in 1952 but not published till 1985, Queer is an enigma - both an unflinching autobiographical self-portrait and a dazzling political novel

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 humour and the Ugly American at his ugliest. Burroughs' only realist love story, Queer is a haunting tale of possession and exorcism.

• Language: English
• Publisher: W. F. Howes Ltd
• Release date: Aug 1, 2013
• ISBN: 9781471242557

William S. Burroughs

William S. Burroughs was born in St. Louis in 1914. He is best-known work is 1959's Naked Lunch-which became the focus of a landmark 1962 Supreme Court decision that helped eliminate literary censorship in the United States. Described by Norman Mailer as one of America's few writers genuinely "possessed by genius," he died in 1997. His many other works include Junky and The Place of Dead Roads (Picador).

Reviews for Queer

[dbsovereign · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Burroughs can be a tad difficult to understand at times. His writing is often poetic and so subject to interpretation. Essentially you often only get out of him what you are willing to put [of yourself] into his writing. He takes us on journeys into his mind, his reality. Long before the days of Identity Politics, he makes us think about how we are all political.

[brakketh-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Pseudo-autobiographical (or psychologically autobiographical) novel wandering around queer sexuality.

[ennuiprayer · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I'm not sure what to say about the book. I enjoyed far more than I did Junky, and I guess that makes me a sinner in the literary world because everyone's up in arms about that book.

I suppose the whole purpose of the book--the sort of sequel to Junky--is that once you drop the drug usage, you decide to have a lot of sex.

I did notice how, since these books are based on Burroughs life--he did leave out the accidental murder of his wife. I guess a lot of it had to do with regret for doing it. I'm not sure.

[danielstj · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I borrowed this from my local library. It was such a degenerate and disturbing piece of work that it was hard for me to get into it. The plot was quite simplistic as well. I had read Naked Lunch previously as an experiment and had, after, read much Kerouac and all of Ginsberg to get into Beat Literature. However, this was not working for me- the intensity of the degeneracy was a little too far for me to enjoy it. I did not find the narrator likeable in any means and, since the narrator is meant to represent Burroughs himself, that is not a good thing.I found myself more interested in the introduction and appendix (the supplementary materials) than the book itself. That speaks on its own.Nevertheless, it was a character study of a lonely, misguided, lustful, and disturbed man. I suppose that you have to take that as you will.2 stars- not recommended.

[lydia1879 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

So I have a tricky relationship with this book.

It's one of the first pieces of queer literature that I ever read, and I read it when I was quite young. I was hungry for representation and depiction of queer characters. I had accepted myself as a queer person and was happy, but I needed validation.

I think it's one of his earlier works and isn't as well-written as some of his others. I'm not sure if it's problematic or not, I would have to reread it, but I'm not sure if I will.

I'm not sure if I will because it was difficult for me to read. The self-loathing and hatred the protagonist portrays is palpable. He looks at his sexuality as a monster or an obstacle he must overcome and the book is just riddled with tension.

If I read it correctly the first time, all those years ago, this character is a partial representation of how Burroughs felt about himself.

So I don't like this book, but it'll always have a place in my heart as one of the first queer pieces of literature I read. I'm glad I read it, but this might not be the best book to pick up if you're just starting with Burroughs, or looking for some uplifting LGBTIQA fiction.

[blanderson-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A clean and intriguing book that goes absolutely nowhere. The prose isn't as sharp or funny as Junky, and the characters/situations seem flat in comparison, as if Bill Lee himself was just going through the motions while awaiting trial for his wife's accidental murder.

Still, an interesting portrait of lust as an addiction, but you can really tell that the novel wasn't completed. It ends, seemingly, halfway through a chapter.

[jwarren42 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Such genius. This is a second read for me, trying out this new edition. Beyond the trip down memory lane, the manuscript notes are just fantastic. Very interesting editor's introduction. The scenes where Lee is alone with Allerton are heartbreaking in their emotional dryness. Staggering work.

[kant1066 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book has been sitting on my library shelves for a couple of years untouched. Since it was William Burroughs, and looked like a fairly quick read, I decided to pick it up. Burroughs is one of the seminal American authors of the underground gay experience, right? I thought it would be like reading Alan Hollinghurst on cocaine - something I was looking forward to.But I was highly disappointed. The novel's plot revolves around gay two heroin addicts, William Lee and Eugene Allerton. Lee's attraction to Allerton is completely and painfully unreciprocated. Despite all of Lee's attempts (which come in the form of embarrassing barside disquisitions in Mexican cantinas) to win Allerton's affections, it is all for naught. They decide to travel in search of some hallucinogenic drug which can only be obtained in the remote rainforest, and Lee promises to pay Allerton's way if he has sex with him a couple of times a week. In the end, the reader gets the impression that the quest for the drug is upset, much like Lee's wish for Allerton to love and appreciate him. The structure of the novel seems unmotivated and disinterested. It really seems to have no narrative "drive." I'm certainly not a reader that needs an action-packed novel by any stretch of the imagination, but there is nothing that compels the reader to keep reading - not even a chance of catching the two characters in licentious acts.But for anyone out there that wants to discover Burroughs for themselves, I definitely recommend this as a first step: it is immanently readable, unlike some of Burroughs' later, more experimental fiction. For this reason, it is a perfect choice for readers who have not hitherto been introduced to some of the more difficult aspects of twentieth century fiction, like non-linear narration, that symptom of dread postmodernism.

[poetontheone · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This sequel (of sorts) to Junky introduces a vulnerable figure in Lee, a thinly veiled Burrroughs who pines for the affections of Allerton, a bar phantom hovering on the outskirts of Lee's acquaintance circle. In parts, an unrequited love (or lust) story, a mythical drug quest, and bursts of weird monologue. In the second half of the book, when the latter two elements come to the fore, the story really gains momentum.

[aeyan_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Decay pervades this novel. I thought it was merely that I had purchased a fairly old yet never used book and that was where the sense of decrepitude emanates, but then I realized it is the odorous imagery Burroughs' invokes of Mexico City and sundry South American locales. From the bars to the characters, the feeling that some elegance has been shatteringly lost, some refinement irrevocably misplaced leaks from the text. This thrilling (if noxious) interplay of word and action lends itself well to the withdrawals the main character Lee feels from heroin and also to his unquenchable lust for younger men. I found myself fascinated by the locales visited by Lee, oddly not irritated by his cantankerous and often somewhat crude and racist commentary about people and place, but rather seeing them react only to what Lee himself was generating. It was an exercise in frustration however to watch him pine for the focused subject of his lust, his diffident conquest and later travel companion Allerton, almost as if Allerton acts as a receptacle for the withdrawal symptoms Lee experiences. In many senses of the word, 'queer' accurately describes this novel. Recalling the historical time period that Burroughs would have used this word - before the reclamation of Queer as an identifier signifying positive difference - Lee brings blatant many of the perjorative uses for it, and also the usage as a marker of something strange or out of sorts. However, taking into account the modern use of queer as a way to positively affirm an identity outside the norm, Queer presents an unglamorous but accepting depiction of a homosexual man, never really emblazoning said queerness in neon pink letters with sparkly lights, but rather showing a sympathetic (if frequently rambling) recovering junky. The queerness of the text comes more to light in Lee's eccentricities than merely in his sexual proclivities.

[djupstrom · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I know I am supposed to like William S. Burroughs for his "greatness" in literature, but I just don't get him...ever. Bad book.

[wendyrey · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Sort and not sweet. Thoroughly nasty book. Wish I could give negative ratings.

[revd-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A piercing, intensely self-analytic novelette. Again a portrait of another time, but perfectly accessible because of its emotional & intellectual honesty. Burroughs served himself well by keeping 'Queer' from publication until the mid-eighties-- complete with a new introduction, it cast an eye backward at how society, American & otherwise, was being shaped by the internal pressures of the citizens it considered its untouchables.

[buzzharper · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great book. Honest and written from the heart. heart.