Publisher's Synopsis
'Reading Burroughs is not only a fascinating, if alarming, intellectual adventure, but also a very enjoyable one. A master of dialogue, a creator of character without contemporary equal, a humorist who gets funnier as his subject gets blacker, and a first-class storyteller, he belongs to that small circle of writers who improve on continued acquaintance and have the ability to extend our awareness of the world and all its possibilities, good and bad' John Calder
It is a measure of William Burroughs's influence and importance as a writer that the very titles of his books have found their way into contemporary language and consciousness: The Naked Lunch, The Soft Machine, The Ticket That Exploded, Nova Express, The Wild Boys, Exterminator . . . This volume contains substantial extracts from all of Burroughs's work, edited and arranged to provide the perfect introduction to this most ferocious and apocalyptic of visionaries.
'William Burroughs is the most interesting American novelist now writing. While many of his contemporaries have become professors of creative writing or empty-headed patriarchs of the word, he has kept faith with his original perception' Peter Ackroyd, Sunday Times
'A mocking contempt for power and its wielders, a shrinking disgust from the flesh, a vision of mankind as almost irredeemably base, a keen eye for moral soft spots in the prevailing culture, a hatred of jargon and pomposity, a profound comic sense, a fierce indignation about privilege and, far from least, a tough, flexible prose style' Paul Ableman, Spectator
'He is the most radical innovator in fiction since Joyce, and probably of comparable importance' Angela Carter, Guardian
