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Peter Ho
Dr. Ahmad
Drugs In Literature
18 March 2019
Society as a Lie: The Language, Structure, and Purpose of Naked Lunch
Born in 1914, William S. Burroughs lived a privileged life, coasting on financial support
from his parents while pursuing whatever interested him at the time. While Burroughs studied
English and anthropology at Harvard, he later enrolled in medical school. It wasn’t until he
enlisted in the military and was subsequently denied that he met the people who would join him
in creating the Beat Generation. Produced as a result of post-WWII fatigue, the antiestablishment literary movement explored and influenced American politics and social values.
Catherine Nash, in her article, “‘An Ephemeral Oddity’?: The Beat Generation and American
Culture”, describes the influence the Beat Generation had, “In the postwar era...the Beats were
regarded by the media as a cohesive social group and their emphasis on individualism was
viewed as a very real threat to the accepted postwar social order that was exemplified in middle
class suburbia”(Nash 54). This quote resonates with the end result of the Beat Generation as it
eventually melded with hippie culture. While the media had much to say about the Beat
Generation, literary critics were “divided as to how seriously to treat Beat Literature and
therefore as to whether or not there was such a phenomenon as a Beat literary movement. Many
critics stridently rejected their work as being without any redeeming literary value…”(Nash 56).
The critics at the time, according to Nash, failed to look past the differences in Beat literature
and assumed that if there was nothing normal about it, there was nothing worth reading. Going
against the norm, the Beat Generation and their literature focused primarily on rejecting standard
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narrative values, spiritualism, the human condition, drugs, and sex. Burroughs’ writing, as one of
the cofounders, reflected many of its ideas, but mainly focused on the theme of choice.
Naked Lunch can be seen as the culmination of everything the Beat Generation stood for.
On the run from American authorities thanks to legal troubles, Burroughs took refuge in Tangier,
Morocco, where he wrote most of Naked Lunch. During this stint, he remained in contact with
fellow Beat Generation members Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac. Hearing about Burroughs’
current writing project, they flew to Morocco to assist the typing, editing, and arranging of the
novel. While Naked Lunch is definitely Burroughs’ creation, the atmosphere of the novel is
entirely Beat Generation. His novel exchanges literary language and standard narrative values for
graphic scenes and chaos in order to highlight the duplicity of society and totalitarian
governments. Drugs and sex are tools utilized in Naked Lunch to demonstrate human nature and
the lack of control they have in their lives.
From reading the first page, Burroughs’ design is immediately noticed. The work is
written in a way that you can start at any point in the novel and read in any direction, free and
encouraged to jump paragraphs and pages at a time. In Megan Wilson’s article, “Your
Reputation Precedes You: A Reception Study of Naked Lunch”, the professor cites a quote from
Burroughs stating his thought process behind Naked Lunch’s structure, “I will simply transcribe
Lee’s [Naked Lunch’s narrator] impressions. . . . The fragmentary quality of my work is inherent
in the method and will resolve itself so far as necessary”(qtd. In Wilson 99). Burroughs, who
introduces William Lee as the ‘main’ character, jumps places and timelines throughout the novel
and intentionally sends the novel into chaos. Even William Lee, whose story is followed the
most consistently, fades into the noise. While existing as an outlier, the format of Naked Lunch is
in line with avoiding standard narrative values. Dr. Michele Russo’s article, “Intertextual and
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Boundary-Crossing Monstrosity in William Burroughs’ Naked Lunch”, delves into why the Beat
Generation did not write in the standard way, “Traditional language is, in fact, the means by
which totalitarian regimes express themselves and maintain their power”(Russo 338). What
Russo describes here is the Beat Generation’s belief that by using traditional language and
standard narratives, you remove your reader’s ability to think for themselves. The author
therefore becomes the shepherd of sheep, leading them down a path and telling them what is real
or right.
By deviating from this method of writing, Burroughs and the other members of the Beat
Generation allow their readers, and society by extension to become more involved in their
decisions. Christopher Breu’s article “The Novel Enfleshed: ‘Naked Lunch’ and the Literature of
Materiality” describes Burroughs’ writing as “written as much against language as inevitably
within or through it”(Breu 203). Breu mentions how ingrained into our society the conventions
of writing are that even the most most experimental writing written by the Beat Generation is
still born in the standards held by the rest of society. “Monstrous Rhetoric: Naked Lunch,
National Security, and the Gothic Fifties” written by Fiona Paton illustrates this issue with
Burroughs’ novel, stating that critics have said in the past that, “Although designed to release the
reader from various social control systems, for which junk is the overarching metaphor, the book
itself is extremely controlling…”(Paton 53). Burroughs, in this quote, is unable to completely
separate from society because his method of communication was born and nurtured in the same
control systems he criticises. A quote that soon follows expands on this, “‘Each word tastes of
the context and contexts in which it has lived its socially charged life’”(Paton 53). Paton believes
that language itself is shaped by our environment. The meaning of words change depending on
both the surrounding words and how we interpret them. In Naked Lunch, William Burroughs
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tries to avoid this by mixing in several stories that all exist in one reality. Russo, regarding the
topic of the turbulent construction of Burroughs’ novel, states that the “Different voices mingle
and clash to cross the linguistic borders and generate further explosions of senses and
meanings...a multi perspective view of the world”(Russo 333). By providing a wider lens into the
world of Naked Lunch, Russo believes that Burroughs’ intent was to show all sides of society
from more than just a single main character.
The main character, however, was chosen for a specific reason. In Kenneth DiMaggio’s
article, “Seceding from the Narrative: How the Criminal Underworlds in William Burroughs’
Naked Lunch Map out a Non-Linear Narrative through the Creation of ‘Temporary Autonomous
Zones’”, he discusses the effects of having a criminal being the narrator has on the novel, “In
Naked Lunch, Burroughs claims narrative space through criminal underworlds or zones where
traditional authority can no longer maintain order. Yet the absence of such authoritarian structure
is also the beginning of a new autonomous social order”(DiMaggio 16). What DiMaggio
describes here is the introduction of what Burroughs believes is the hidden truth. A normal
person will never be able to see both sides of the story because their lives are controlled by the
government, a single side of a coin.
The publication of the novel itself had a problem getting its message out. From the
beginning of its inception, Naked Lunch failed multiple times in its attempts to be published
because of its graphic content. Celebrating 50 years of publication, NPR held a podcast
discussing the infamous book’s creation, publication, and the problems it encountered on the
way, “The shocking reality of "Naked Lunch" caused a furor when excerpts were published in
the University of Chicago's literary magazine in 1958. A Paris pornographer took note and
published "Naked Lunch" in France the following year. Then in 1962, Grove Press issued the
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first American edition. A year later, a Boston bookstore owner was arrested for selling
it.”(Norris). Soon after the arrest, the novel itself was put on trial by the government and
eventually ascended the judicial ladder until it reached the Massachusetts Supreme Court.
This purpose of the trial was to determine whether or not the book should be censored for
obscenity or had any of the aforementioned literary value. The following outcry from the
announcement of the trial from the literary community was tremendous. Reality Studio, a
website dedicated to William S . Burroughs, published the transcripts of the trial on their
website, titled “The Boston Trial of Naked Lunch”. One famous quote about Naked Lunch came
from Burroughs’ close friend Allen Ginsberg, “A naked lunch is natural to us, we eat reality
sandwiches. But allegories are so much lettuce. Don't hide the madness”(The Boston Trial).
Ginsberg closed his statement with this poem as his intent was for the people involved in the trial
to realise that the contents of Naked Lunch are as real as any fiction book found on a shelf. The
only difference between the two is that Burroughs didn’t hide his intent behind allegories or
creative language. He presented an idea without making it easy to digest. In the end, Naked
Lunch was not only not censored, but it became the last book to be put on trial for censorship. It
survived based on the hype generated from the controversy, as well as numerous endorsements
from its publishers and book reviews. The ruling by the court also had an unforeseen
development, “Because of its trial, ‘the legal question of obscenity after 1966 no longer
concerned works of literature’”(qtd. In Wilson 112). This change basically meant that words
written in a book cannot be judged by a court of law for obscenity.
The question of obscenity mostly lied in the vivid descriptions of drugs and sex.
However, a huge portion of the novel is dedicated to the way governments are ran. Dylan
Belgrado, in his article “The Significance of Sex and Drugs in William Burroughs’ Naked Lunch
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and Bret Easton Ellis’ American Psycho”, analyzes exactly what William Burroughs is trying to
unveil. “According to Burroughs, the US is suffocating and no one can evade its control;
freedom is gone. Rejecting the conservative American values of 1950s, Burroughs attacks
society’s obsession with control”(Belgrado 27). Control is something that Belgrado notices is
important to both Burroughs and Naked Lunch. Within the novel, Burroughs discusses a major
reason that democracies fail, “Democracy is cancerous, and bureaus are its cancer. A bureau
takes root anywhere in the state, turns malignant like the Narcotic Bureau, and grows and grows,
always reproducing more of its own kind, until it chokes the host if not controlled or
excised”(Burroughs 112). In this quote, Burroughs states that the problem doesn’t lie in
democracy, but how it delegates issues. His dislike is with the people in charge of democracy,
rather than democracy itself.
Supporting this notion, Belgrado considers Burroughs’ beliefs that “the Senate and
Congress can only participate in trivial matters. Burroughs deems the state untrustworthy, and
therefore supports cooperatives”(Belgrado 28). Burroughs includes a line about cooperatives in
Naked Lunch and it has a positive overtone that stands out as rather off-color when compared to
the rest of the book. “A cooperative on the other hand can live without the state. That is the road
to follow”(Burroughs 112). He further explains that bureaus differ from cooperatives by looking
out for their own selfish desires, creating problems where there is not any. A cooperative would
work towards examining all options and deciding what’s best for everyone.
Naked Lunch’s setting, titled Interzone, is analyzed by Ron Loewinsohn in his article
“‘Gentle Reader, I Fain Would Spare You This, but My Pen Hath Its Will like this Ancient
Mariner’: Narrator(s) and Audience in William S. Burroughs ‘Naked Lunch’”, “Interzone
reflects or represents a composite of the cities where Burroughs lived...Control of the city is, like
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everything else in this world, unstable”(Loewinsohn 571). Loewinsohn goes on to describe the
three factions vying for control of Interzone, stating that Burroughs uses them as symbols for
fascism, totalitarianism, and moderates. This fighting is seen as unproductive and only adds to
the stagnant nature of society.
Within the novel, Jang Jung Hoon, who wrote “Invisible Power and a Flight for SelfEstablishment: Focused on Naked Lunch & One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” believes that
Burroughs’ disgust with the government is embodied in the character Dr. Benway. The character
“outwardly claims to support free commonwealth and executive policies for citizens, but
inwardly is a liar and double-faced person coveting power”(Jang 399). Burroughs’ own
description supports this idea as he has William Lee think about who Dr. Benway really is, “Dr.
Benway had been called in as the advisor for the Freeland Republic...Benway is a manipulator
and coordinator of symbol systems, an expert on all phases of interrogation, brainwashing and
control”(Burroughs 19). Dr. Benway, by Burroughs’ design, thrives on the control of others
muhc like the bureaus described earlier.
Jang discusses how Dr. Benway slowly built his impervious control of society, “To
superficially minimize people’s complaints and gripes, he has supplied a sufficient quantity of
necessities and created conditions where people can satisfy their sexual needs in a personal
dimension. Furthermore, he has shut down notorious concentration camps...Even though he was
able to win people’s favor with pork-barrel policies, at the bottom of his heart, he has caused
people to become followers who cannot collectively disobey him”(Jung 401). This is in line with
Burroughs’ descriptions of bureaus, where Benway has established so much control that he is at
a point where he can do whatever he wants with no fear of punishment.
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Continuing with the theme of control versus choice, Burroughs’ usage of drugs in Naked
Lunch is unique in the way that he uses people as the descriptions rather than the topic. This
forms a dichotomy with the general atmosphere surrounding drugs and addicts during the 1950s
and 1960s. Frederick Whiting’s article “Monstrosity on Trial: The Case of ‘Naked Lunch’”
divulges the history of drug addiction research, “Lindesmith observed that the predominant
medical theory of the day placed the majority of addicts in classificatory categories either
derivative of or closely correlated with psychopathy…’normal’ addicted individuals represented
only 13 or 14 percent of the overall population...the rest were divided into groups such as
‘inadequate personalities,’ ‘criminalism,’ and ‘homosexuality,’ all of which were explained by
the underlying condition of psychopathy”(Whiting 151). Whiting describes the foundation of
drug addiction as having been built on the idea that most of addicts were psychopathic. By doing
this, it dehumanizes the people involved and creates a negative perception of their sickness. In
Frank McConnell’s “William Burroughs and the Literature of Addiction”, McConnell describes
Naked Lunch as the fullest articulation of the literature of addiction (McConnell 679). The
literature of addiction is a term that McConnell coins as having multiple forms, changing
depending on what the story focuses on. By placing the spotlight on the drugs instead of the
people, Burroughs makes the story less about what is right or wrong. He allows the story to be
open-minded and gives the reader the ability to decide for themselves their opinions on drugs,
addicts, and the effect they have on society. Belgrado discusses this point, stating that Burroughs
uses the idea of drugs as a way to escape from the clutches of those in charge. “Burroughs’
depiction of drug use is both a symbol of rebellion against the conventions of the fifties and a
metaphor for individuality and freedom of choice, be it in an informed way” (Belgrado 39).
Belgrado, in this quote, explains why William Burroughs chooses to have so many graphic
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descriptions of drug use. Throughout the novel, Burroughs generates scenes ranging from
brilliant displays of color, to horrors unimaginable to the ordinary person. The pleasures of
cocaine are linked directly to the images of people walking around with needles still stuck skin
deep. The descriptions play both sides of the field, showing the benefits and the negatives of
taking drugs, allowing the individual the ability to make the decision for themselves.
Sex is used by Burroughs in a different way within Naked Lunch. Belgrado believes that
instead of attacking the governmental facet of society, William Burroughs critiques middle class
values in regards to sex. By including an uncountable amount of sexual acts, Burroughs produces
two effects. While the first reason is to allow people to get used to reading them, Belgrado looks
into the many taboos and fetishes that are contained in the pages of Naked Lunch such as
pedophilia, homosexuality, and pegging. These topics are used by Burroughs in both honest and
sarcastic ways that allow the story to present society with the truth. Alex Wermer-Colan
discusses an interesting correlation between the actions both the society of Naked Lunch and real
life conduct in order to make people reveal their deviancy, “Dr. Benway interrogates Carl
Peterson about his sexual orientation, emphasizing the state’s view that ‘sexual deviation’ is ‘a
sickness’ like tuberculosis, which the state must prevent from spreading...the reciprocal and
symbiotic relationship between Freeland’s pathologization of sexual deviance and surveillance of
the populace by interrogation also proved valuable for Cold War America”(Wermer-Colan 499).
Wermer-Colan goes on to explain how the US government, in the 1950’s, performed similar
tasks of ousting its employees in fear that sexual deviancy can spread.
Within Dr. Benway’s interrogation of Carl Peterson, Carl is given a test to reveal whether
or not he has homosexual tendencies. The test consists of a group of pictures and Carl has to
decide what pictures look attractive. In the end, Dr. Benway reveals that, “‘...some of these
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girls...are really boys. In uh drag I believe is the word?’”(Burroughs 163). The purpose of this
test in regards to Burroughs’ intended message was to reveal prejudices and vague assumptions
middle class society held in regards to sexuality. This thought is further analyzed by Paton’s
article discussing Burroughs’ own difficulties with the homosexual identity, “Burroughs’ own
identity as a masculine queer is shaped by the dominant culture even as he opposes it. This
masculinization is a reaction to a 1950s episteme that constructed the gay man as effeminate, an
identity that Burroughs strenuously rejected”(Paton 59). This rejection of societal beliefs
presented by Paton is easily seen in Burroughs’ representation of himself as William Lee.
While Belgrado notes that while Burroughs doesn’t try to defend pedophilia, the Beat
Generation novelist uses it as an extreme to make people realise that he is not saying that
everything in life is false. Burroughs wants people to realize the hypocrisy that lies under their
outward disgust and begin to think for themselves. Whiting explains it as social values blending
together sexual deviancy with drug addiction and psychopathy, “Alternatively explained as
suffering a permanent condition and a curable disorder...the only certainty was that he was
different from normal people”(Whiting 152). Whiting elaborates, stating that by separating
sexual deviancy from the identity of normal people, the general populace became afraid of both
the deviants and deviant thoughts. Burroughs attempts to show a world that is closer to the truth
than the science of his time.
This extends to the book as a whole. Burroughs wrote Naked Lunch in order to tell a story
that has more words than the pages can hold. The influence of the Beat Generation is fused with
every letter in the way that it is both uniquely political and personal. The grotesque imagery,
while jarring, is not without purpose. The world that Burroughs and Naked Lunch presents is
both horrific and fascinating in the way that it relates to our own. This is described by Breu as a
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type of Lacanian register, “Lacan’s conception of language-coincident with his category of the
symbolic-is but one element in his tripartite schema of subjectivity and its relationship to the
social. The other two elements of course are the imaginary and the real. While the imaginary
largely overlaps (and over-determines) the symbolic, the real is precisely that which
traumatically underpins, but is disavowed by, the symbolic, what eludes or resists it”(Breu 204).
What Breu describes here is Burroughs’ usage of both real and alternate reality and the way he
blends them together to create the society of Naked Lunch. It is his own reality, one where we
can see the connections to our own. Hidden under the filth of sex, violence, and drug abuse, there
are nuggets of truth and wisdom that Burroughs tries to reveal. The title itself is one of the
messages the Beat Generation communicates to the reader, “The title means exactly what the
words say: NAKED Lunch-a frozen moment when everyone sees what is on the end of every
fork”(Burroughs 199). Naked Lunch’s purpose, like most of the Beat Generation’s writing, was
to unveil the hidden properties of society and have each and every person evaluate what their
society values and think about if that is best for everyone.
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Work Cited
Belgrado, Dylan. “The Significance of Sex and Drugs in William Burroughs’ Naked Lunch and
Bret Easton Ellis’ American Psycho.” Ghent University, 2014.
“The Boston Trial of Naked Lunch.” RealityStudio, realitystudio.org/texts/naked-lunch/trial/.
Breu, Christopher. “The Novel Enfleshed: ‘Naked Lunch’ and the Literature of Materiality.”
Twentieth Century Literature, vol. 57, no. 2, 2011, pp. 199–223. JSTOR,
www.jstor.org/stable/41698742.
Burroughs, William S. Naked Lunch. Edited by James Grauerholz and Barry Miles, Grove Press,
2013.
DiMaggio, Kenneth. “Seceding from the Narrative: How the Criminal Underworlds in William
Burroughs’ Naked Lunch Map out a Non-Linear Narrative through the Creation of
‘Temporary Autonomous Zones.’” International Journal of the Book, vol. 8, no. 1, Mar.
2011, pp. 11–18. EBSCOhost, doi:10.18848/1447-9516/CGP/v08i01/36844.
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Jang, Jung Hoon. “Invisible Power and a Flight of Self-Establishment: Focused on Naked Lunch
& One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.” Journal of English Language and Literature, vol.
62, no. 3, 2016, pp. 397–421., doi:10.15794.
McConnell, Frank D. “William Burroughs and the Literature of Addiction.” The Massachusetts
Review, vol. 8, no. 4, 1967, pp. 665–680. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/25087654.
Nash, Catherine. “‘An Ephemeral Oddity’? The Beat Generation and American Culture.”
Working with English: Medieval and Modern Language, Literature and Drama, vol. 2,
no. 1, 2006, pp. 54–60.
Norris, Michele. “Burroughs' 'Naked Lunch,' Still Fresh At 50.” NPR, NPR, 8 Oct. 2009,
www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=113610846.
Paton, Fiona. “Monstrous Rhetoric: Naked Lunch, National Insecurity, and the Gothic Fifties.”
Texas Studies in Literature and Language, vol. 52, no. 1, 2010, pp. 48–69. JSTOR,
www.jstor.org/stable/40755564.
Russo, Michele. “Intertextual and Boundary-Crossing Monstrosity in William Burroughs’ Naked
Lunch.” European Scientific Journal, vol. 1, 2015,
eujournal.org/index.php/esj/article/view/5102.
Wermer-Colan, Alex. “Implicating the Confessor: The Autobiographical Ploy in William S.
Burroughs's Early Work.” Twentieth Century Literature, vol. 56, no. 4, 2010, pp. 493–
529. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/41413713.
Whiting, Frederick. “Monstrosity on Trial: The Case of ‘Naked Lunch.’” Twentieth Century
Literature, vol. 52, no. 2, 2006, pp. 145–174. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/20479763.
Wilson, Meagan. “Your Reputation Precedes You: A Reception Study of Naked Lunch.” Journal
of Modern Literature, vol. 35, no. 2, 2012, p. 98., doi:10.2979/jmodelite.35.2.98.
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