About this Item
Octavo, 255 pages. In Good condition with a Good minus condition dust jacket. Black fading into white spine with faded red and white lettering. Dust jacket is wrapped in a mylar covering, price is uncut "$6.00", has moderate wear along the extremities, mild to moderate age-toning throughout, a large tear along the rear tail edge, moderate chipping and bending wear along the head joint corner, stains throughout, and tape along the front fore edge. Boards have mild wear along the edges, a dent along the head edge, mild wear along the fore corners, and mild wear and bending along the spine head and tail edges. Textblock has stains on the rear end-page, mild adhesive wear along the pastedowns, mild wear along the edges, stains on the fore and tail edges, moderate age-toning along the edges, and black inking on the head edge. Inscribed on the title page reading "For Dick Gabler", signed William Burroughs, and dated '6/12/1992'. DL consignment. Shelved Case 6. William S. Burroughs was born February 5, 1914 in St. Louis, Missouri to the prominent Burroughs family, his grandfather founding the Burroughs Corporation. He took a very early interest in magic and the occult, claiming visions of grey apparitions and a green reindeer as a child. Burroughs lived in Vienna, Austria for a time following his graduation from Harvard, taking part in its underground gay culture moving amongst circles of gays, exiles, and runaways amidst whom he met Isle Klapper, a German Jewish woman fleeing the Nazi regime. The pair became close friends, marrying so Klapper could get a visa to the United States, after which they divorced, remaining friends for years afterwards. After a brief stint in the military, Burroughs parents grew increasingly worried about his mental health. Burroughs had a string of odd-jobs before leaving to New York City with some friends from St. Louis. During his time in New York, Burroughs would become addicted to morphine, dealing heroin to feed the habit, and began a relationship with a woman named Joan Vollmer Adams who would become his common-law wife after Burroughs divorce from Klapper. The pair would live in Mexico until 1951 when Burroughs shot Vollmer, killing her and getting their children taken into custody by their respective grandparents. This was a pivotal moment for Burroughs, solidifying a nonlinear method of writing first truly seen in "Naked Lunch". Burroughs had written before "Naked Lunch", publishing "Junkie" in 1953 and writing "Queer" between 1951-1953, which wouldn't see publication until 1985. "Naked Lunch" was written by Burroughs in Tangiers where he had settled in 1954. "Naked Lunch," published in 1959, received very mixed reviews upon publication. Proponents of the novel called it a satire in the vein of Jonathan Swift while critics called it obscene trash. The novel was very controversial for it's depictions of drug use and body horror, being considered obscene by the U.S. Post Office, the state of Massachusetts, and the city of Los Angeles which sparked a landmark censorship case which saw the courts initially label the book too obscene to be sold, a decision which was overturned by the Supreme Court. It is considered by many a dystopian science fiction and has inspired the rock and cyberpunk genres. This specific copy is in a first state dust jacket, with the zip code absent from the address on the back. 1387236. Shelved Dupont Bookstore. First U.S. Edition, First Printing, First State Dust Jacket.
Seller Inventory # 1387236
Contact seller
Report this item
