Naked Lunch

Sorry Trev, I waited a while to make the dual entry, but as far I know you haven't finished Naked Lunch. What a shame. I once heard that you should read William S. Burroughs' Naked Lunch without caring about the plot or characters, but pay more attention to the way it makes you feel and the emotions it invokes. If that's the case, I consider it my duty to let you know that I came away from the novel feeling confused and slightly disgusted. This isn't a bad thing, in fact I think it was Burroughs' intention the whole time. Remember on South Park when everyone reads Catcher in the Rye and gets disappointed by how tame it seemed? Well Naked Lunch is more on the Scrotie McBoogerBalls side of the spectrum. It's loaded with rape between all sorts of people (and non-people) and drug use, and it's written in pretty graphic detail. It's no surprise then that the book was banned all over the place at the time of it's publication. It kind of also reminded me of watching A Clockwork Orange- I didn't think something made decades ago would have enough shock value to make me uncomfortable, but it held up after all these years. The difference here is that A Clockwork Orange had a coherent plot and some easily identifiable lessons. Naked Lunch has plenty of plot, but very little of it connects. Bits of hilarity and top-notch satire are lost in a sea of rape. Man, so much rape. Well, Naked Lunch was another one of those "out of my comfort zone" reads, and I can't say I'll be going back to Burroughs any time soon, but at least that's one more book off of my list.