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Naked Lunch (Harperperennial Classics)

Author: William S. Burroughs
Publisher: Flamingo
Category: Book

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Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars

16 reviews
Sales Rank: 21869

Media: Paperback
Edition: New Ed
Pages: 208
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.8

ISBN: 0586085602
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9780586085608
ASIN: 0586085602

Publication Date: November 20, 1986
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: POSTED SAME DAY FROM THE UK. Different picture on cover.

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Customer Reviews: Read 11 more reviews...

1 out of 5 stars

The emperors new clothes September 13, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful

I read Junky and really enjoyed it, it is written by a man in control of his thoughts, reflecting on times when he wasn't.
I bought this book and quite literally threw it in the bin after the first 40 or so pages. Perhaps if you persevere with it..... well,I couldn't. It starts with nonsensical drug babble and random paedophile fantasy. If thats clever writing, I don't see how. If the rest of the book continues in that vein then what can anyone possibly get out of reading it? Perhaps it gets better, I wasn't willing to find out. If you want drug babble, why not take some drugs and create your own? in my experience your own babble is far more interesting.

1 out of 5 stars

Cold Turkey October 19, 2005
2 out of 4 found this review helpful

I received this as a gift and initially I was enthusiastic about reading it, being interested in all things psychadelic. However this book reads like a disgusting, terror-filled comedown from a heroin, LSD and Ecstacy cocktail. It seems each line is written for shock value alone, and it usually ends with some sort of allusion to power, human depravity or homosexuality, forced or otherwise. If you want to follow what's going on you really have to concentrate hard, and it's hardly rewarding to bother, cos nothing is really going on, just the images and thoughts in the head of a drug addict, all running into each other without a pattern. If you want to take a trip down the 'darkest recesses of the human psyche' then you'd be better off writing down the words of a back-alley junkie, it would be far more coherent. The only thing of interest is Burrough's explanation of how he got himself off heroin, and that this successful technique is still ignored. But two or three pages can't save a book.

5 out of 5 stars

Don't expect satisfaction on a conventional level June 28, 2005
3 out of 3 found this review helpful

Cut to the chase

This is not so much a novel as a sumation of all that is dark about humanity and sexuality, reduced over an intense fire of 'corrupted' intelligence to a black morass of putrifaction and, strangely, moral nutrality. The fact there is no real plot and all characters are at best two dimensional is irrelevant. Enjoy.

1 out of 5 stars Double ho-hum December 14, 2004
8 out of 11 found this review helpful

Like being stuck in a lift with a vagrant who won't stop muttering obsceneties at you. Most of it is incoherent, a lot of it is nonsense and the rest of it is just unpleasant.
It's the only book I've ever chosen to read of my own free will that I've never finished. I have rarely been so bored when reading a book, in fact I alternated between disgust and boredom.
I'm sure that makes me awfully shallow but frankly, I don't care as long as I never have to try and read this book again

5 out of 5 stars Relax July 21, 2004
5 out of 7 found this review helpful

I'm not going to go on about how great it coz it's incredible. I just wanted to say though that this kind of stuff isn't as inpenetrable as it first looks. I would say that it isn't as dense as people often make it out to be either. If it was cut into short scenes and arranged on the page like a poem, I think people would be less intimidated. Relax and don't get bogged down by concentrating too hard. See the book as a painting, look at the shapes and surfaces. Then go back and bring 'meaning' to it if you like. Also I'd read 'Junky' first and then take on this one as he blows up many of the ideas in Junky and then pastes them into Naked Lunch and if your aware of that then it gives Naked Lunch a bit more continuity. Also it helps to know what his 'non-hallucinogenic' voice sounds like. Enjoy your meal.