by Barry Miles (Author)
Iconoclast; visionary; homosexual crusader; drug advocate; teacher and elder statesman to Jack Kracouac, Allen Ginsberg and the Beats; anti-hero guru to each successive counter-culture generation: Willaim Burroughs remains one of the most complex and controversial American writers of the twentieth century. A longtime heroin addict, Burroughs preferred to live abroad, away from America's Draconian drug laws. After killing his wife in a bizarre shooting accident, he moved to Tangier where he lived in male brothel and wrote his celebrated bestseller Naked Lunch - in Newsweek's words 'A masterpiece. A cry from Hell' - as a series of letters to Allen Ginsberg. He lived at the Beat Hotel in Paris and spent a decade in London before returning as prodigal son to New York in 1974 after 25 years of self imposed exile.
Format: Paperback
Pages: 288
Edition: 2Rev Ed
Publisher: Virgin Books
Published: 05 Sep 2002
ISBN 10: 0753507072
ISBN 13: 9780753507070
Book Overview: Repackaged and refreshed, this seminal biography of a counter-cultural icon is re-issued to form a core part of the Virgin backlist: '[Miles's] mastery of Beat Generation know-how must surely be unrivalled.' Sunday Telegraph