During the first meeting of the
New Year (10th of January 2013), club members discussed William Burroughs’ most
notorious novel: “Naked Lunch”.
During the presentation we looked at various points of view (or ‘vantage points’), through which the novel could be read: The life in post-WWII United States of America, the addiction and fatal tragedy in William Burroughs’ life, his methods of writing and the mixed critical reception of the book. Throughout the meeting we discussed the cut-up and fold-in methods of writing, the nightmarish visions and the postmodernist approach towards the Naked Lunch.
During the presentation we looked at various points of view (or ‘vantage points’), through which the novel could be read: The life in post-WWII United States of America, the addiction and fatal tragedy in William Burroughs’ life, his methods of writing and the mixed critical reception of the book. Throughout the meeting we discussed the cut-up and fold-in methods of writing, the nightmarish visions and the postmodernist approach towards the Naked Lunch.
“What are writers doing? I’ll confine the use of this term to writers of novels. Well, in once sense they are creating a universe in which they have lived or where they would like to live. To what extent writers can actually do or how useful it is form it is for their craft to act out there writing in so-called ‘real life’ is a very open question. For example, are you making your world more like real life or are you pulling real life into your work.” - William S. Burroughs
by Konrad Juszczyszyn
