Pages 1-74

The book starts with an intense introduction which I think is my favorite so far. We begin with the main character, Linoel, describing his tourette's syndrome:
"My Adam's apple bobbing, jaw muscle beating like a miniature heart under my cheek, the noise suppressed, the words escaping silently, mere ghosts of themselves, husks empty of breath and tone. In this diminished form the words rush out of the cornucopia of my brain to course over the surface of the world, tickling reality like fingers on piano keys."
Lethem has written vividly throughout the story so far and really creates the scene inside your head. I've noticed that Lethem presents the characters tourette's as a disability but also a blessing. In the very first passage of the book Lethem uses both negative and positive words to describe his tourette's. Lethem describes the words Lionel speaks due to his tourette's as mere ghosts of words, empty and suppressed. Yet, when they reach the worlds surface they tickle reality like the fingers on piano keys.

The book begins with the main character Linoel and his partner Gilbert in a stake out in front of a hotel. They do not know what they're looking for , just that they're looking. They sit inside their Lincoln waiting for their boss Minna while eating food. While they're waiting we get an understanding on how Linoel deals with his Tourette's such as crying out words and tapping consistently. Soon Minna shows up and goes inside the hotel. When Minna leaves Gilbert and Linoel have been told to follow Minna in the car. In heavy Brooklyn traffic Gilbert loses Minna and after searching they find him in a trash can badly stabbed. The first chapter ends with Linoel and Gilbert hearing that Minna didn't make it. The only clue as to who did it was the punchline of a joke and the name Irving.
The next chapter goes back into time when Linoel was 13 and living in St. Vincents Home for Boys and did not know of his condition yet. Linoel meets Minna when he calls for four white boys to help him in his business. The others were Tony, Gilbert, and Danny. The boys do a series of small moving jobs for Minna and get paid 20 bucks and some beer. The boys don't form a very tight relationship but respect each other and look out for each other. As Linoel goes through puberty he starts to realize this he can no longer control his tics and begins to be called the 'human freak show.'

Linoel and the other boys do not know who their parents are and Minna continually gives off hints that he knows and could "present" them too the boys at any time. This thought is more of a threat to the boys than a gift, because their parents could not be what the other boys hoped for. The oldest, Tony, has this idea that his Italian family will one day pick him up and drive him away. Minna instead tells him that he looks Greek or Puerto Rican and says that any of the unwed teenage girls could be his mother. This scares most of the boys. Minna tells Linoal that Essrog is such a rare name that Linoel should look it up in the phone book, he does and finds three listings.

I feel that Linoel is ashamed of his tourette's yet he believes that his disease shows him a lot about other people. On page 43 Linoel describes "Tourette's teaches you what people will ignore and forget, teaches you to see the reality-knitting mechanism people employ to tuck away and the intolerable, the incongruous, the disruptive - it teaches you this because you're the one lobbing the intolerable, incongruous, and disruptive their way."

Change in Author

Now I have gotten about half way through Naked Lunch and wached the movie to help me understand what was going on. I am still completly lost as to what is going on in Naked Lunch. The movie seems to be losely based off the book and more about going over what happened in William Burroughs life at the time. I haven't been able to post any blogs because I honsetly do not understand a thing that I have read except for a portion of the book which was a few chapters about an intense orgy. I didn't want to give up on William Burroughs but this is a battle I cannot win. I decided to change my author on Friday of last week and went to the book store yesterday. I looked around and found John Stienbeck. I really admire his work and found a few books that I would definetly be intersted in. I thought that I would keep him as a fall back author if I couldn't find any others. I looked around some more and found three huge novels by Susan Straight. I read the first few pages and was intrigued, but I reasoned that the books were pretty thick and I don't have much time left. I continued down to check out Alen Ginsberg but on the way stumbled on Jonathon Lethem. The cover of the book caught my attention first. It was called "Cartoons and Men" and was decorated with cartoon characters on the cover. I read the first few pages and was instantly hooked. There was a huge row of his books and I kept picking them up and being hooked by the first few pages. I went home and looked him up and re-read what I had read before and still loved it. Jonathon Lethem grew up in Brooklyn around the 1970's and lived in a poor urban neighborhood. A lot of his writing his based off of how he grew up as a poor white kid in a mostly black neighborhood. It brings in elements such as musical influence and culture which is also an intersting element.

Chapter 1-9 Pages 3-69

Since I couldn't find any books other than Naked Lunch I am reading this book first while I find the others. So far I am on chapter 9 and have no idea on what the book is about. It is very wild writing and very confusing at times. I understand that it seems to be about different junkies living in this totalitarian government, I'm not really sure. The only chapter I really understood was 4 when it talked about this man being shown this psyche ward were junkies were kept and being tested on. A few chapters are just blurbs of someone shooting up or explaining what each drug does to the brain to make the person addicted. Its a pretty over whelming book and I can only read a little bit at a time because when I end a chapter I realize that I don't know what is going on, and have to re-read everything. The chapter I am on currently is all about gay sex with young boys and I am confused on the point of it. I think to understand what it is going on I am going to have to research the book and try to find someone analyzing each chapter.

William S Burroughs

I would like to do my American author paper on William S. Burroughs. Burroughs was born in Missouri and traveled around across the United States throughout his life time. Burroughs was a main part of the Beat Generation and was friends with famous writers such as Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg. I am interested in this writer because of his ability to write about things which had effected his life such as being a heroin addict. I am most interested in his experimental writing fueled on politics and science fiction.
Burroughs collaborated with Kerouac on writing a novel loosely based off of the murder of a homosexual which Kerouac and their friend Lucian Carr were involved in. A few years later after accidentally shooting his wife to death Burroughs was inspired to continue writing. Once Burroughs stated, “I am forced to the appalling conclusion that I would have never become a writer but for Joan’s Death.“ Burroughs is known as one of the most influential American authors of the 20th century due to his obscene experiential writing on subjects such as drug addiction, sexuality, and paranoia.
Burroughs writing went against the standard convention of language and is known to be “fragmentary and abstract.” He influenced many science fiction authors like J.G Ballard and Michael Moorcock. Burroughs’ many abstract and controversial writing will give me a lot of reference to base a literary argument. Burroughs anarchistic writing inspired many counterculture movements such as the beats, hippie, and even punks. I would like to see what his ideas are and see the similarity in the viewpoints of the punk rock movement. I would like to read a book from each other Burroughs writing period, to see how he changed and matured as a writer. The books I am considering are: Junkie, Naked Lunch, and The Wild Boys. I plan to read these books in the order of earliest to latest in order to see the difference in his writing and change in themes (if any).
I have never read any books from the Beatnik generation and would really like too, because in a sense these are the people which lead to revolutionary movements which I am interested in like the hippie generation and punk movement. William Burroughs sounds like a very interesting character and since he has been through a rough life I anticipate his writing to be really raw and in your face. This raw writing is what intrigues me the most, and I am really excited to start on this project.