NAKED LUNCH

William S. Burroughs is one of the most pathetic figures in modern literature, his
sadness made more poignant because it has been drawn out for so long. His cadaverous
presence gave a hollow echo to a key scene in “Drugstore Cowboy,” in which he was a
junkie ex-priest who has long decades of pain in his eyes. It didn’t seem like acting. And
in a recent documentary about his life, Burroughs came across as a man who walks
around with something wounded inside, something that hurts so much that his spirit
simply shut down.

That aspect of Burroughs is celebrated at feature length in “Naked Lunch,” the

new David Cronenberg film in which Peter Weller gives a performance as evocative as it
is depressing, as a fictional character obviously meant to be taken as the author. The
film opens with “William Lee” making one of his periodic attempts to go straight. He has
kicked drugs, he claims, and is gainfully employed as an insect exterminator. But his
wife (Judy Davis) is addicted to the bug powder, and so is Bill, to such an extent that
millions of cockroaches owe him their lives.

Weller has studied the film on Burroughs and probably even met the man. He has the
manner down flat: The low, flat, graveled voice. The dead eyes. The anonymous suits
and ties, worn as a disguise for the outlaw inside. The fedora pulled low on the forehead.
The lack of any visible display of emotion. I did not like the character - who could? - but
I admire Weller’s artistry in creating this portrait of the living dead.

The character is an unsuccessful writer who has turned to pornography to support

himself, and of course Burroughs did much of his now-acclaimed work in that genre,
including “Naked Lunch.” His days, when they are not spent in desultory work or
experiments with bug powder and other substances, are devoted to aimless sessions of
cynical talk, delivered in perfunctory monosyllables. During one such evening he and his
wife perform their celebrated William Tell party trick, during which he shoots things off
her head with a pistol. This night he is a bad shot, and the bullet hits her square in the
forehead.

Such a tragedy actually did occur. Burroughs did accidentally shoot his wife, although
apparently he did not read her death as a warning that maybe he should cut back on the
old bug powder. In the film, her death opens the yawning pits of paranoia and
schizophrenia for the author, who begins to hallucinate that his wife is still before him,
who thinks he is being investigated by “Interzone,” and whose typewriters turn into
large bugs that communicate through their pulsating sphincters.

Joining Weller are a group of supporting actors who are all able to hit the dry note of
insects rustling in the walls. Roy Scheider is the quack doctor and drug dealer, and Ian
Holm and Julian Sands are inhabitants of Interzone. Davis, as the wife, is playing her
second muse of the year (she was the inspiration for the Faulkner character in “Barton
Fink”), in a performance so different from the first it underlines her range.
But I’m spinning my wheels here, maybe to avoid the paradox of this film: While I
admired it in an abstract way, I felt repelled by the material on a visceral level. There is
so much dryness, death and despair here, in a life spinning itself out with no joy.

Burroughs inhabits the madhouse of his mind, and as he is addressed by bugs and
phantoms and the specter of his murdered wife, the most horrifying thing of all is that
he reacts in the same detached, cold way. All except for a moment of grief he permits
himself over her dead body. One suspects he could have cried out with the same rage
and hurt all of his life.

Major characters
Narrator
The narrator serves as an alter ego for William Burroughs; hence
he appears under a number of different names in different stories.
In a few chapters of Naked Lunch, he seems to write about himself
in the third person. The narrator flees narcotics agents in New
York and travels extensively through the United States, Mexico,
and an alternate version of this world. He samples drugs,
attempts to go through rehab, and goes to work for a shadowy
organization called Islam Inc. He documents the exploits of his
fellow Islam Inc. agents, as well as the locals of the places he
visits. These people have little connection to one another, and the
narrator seems disconnected from all of them, meeting many
people but isolated from them all.

Dr. Benway
Dr. Benway is put in charge of a Reconditioning Center in
Freeland, where he conducts torturous experiments on his
patients in the guise of scientific study and “treatment.” He
considers himself highly skilled as a surgeon, but he seems more
interested in inflicting pain and harm on the people he
encounters. He works with the narrator but seems to have little
interest in the narrator’s addictions or sexual behavior, though he
is highly interested in these habits in others.

A.J.
A.J.’s long list of pranks includes inducing an orgy at a U.S.
Embassy function and opening a boys’ school with a homoerotic
statue in the front entrance. He appears harmless as a jokester,
but his real purpose seems to involve disrupting the status quo
wherever he goes—an agenda that seems politically motivated
given his associations with Islam Inc. However, it is unclear what
he means to accomplish, precisely. A.J. hosts an annual party that
seems a debauched occasion. One of these parties features
entertainment in the form of a blue (pornographic) movie that
features the performers alternately copulating with and killing
each other.
Hassan
Hassan begins his career as The Shoe Store Kid, exchanging
sexual favors with foot fetishists for drugs. He makes a fortune
trading in “slunks,” the afterbirths of cows. He expands his
interests to include other drugs and opens a sex shop in
Yokohama. He is also described as a “notorious Liquefactionist.”
He belongs to the Liquefactionist party in Interzone, a group that
hopes to control citizens by absorbing them into the party.
Otherwise, they are “given to every form of perversion, especially
sado-masochistic practices.” Hassan’s perversions come to the
fore at an orgy he hosts in his “rumpus room,” which includes a
vast range of sexual behavior and violence.
Clem and Jody Clem and Jody operate as a unit for Islam Inc.
They are said to be sympathetic to the Russians, so they travel the
world wreaking havoc in the name of making the United States
look bad.

Andrew Keif
Andrew Keif is a novelist living in Interzone.
Aracknid Aracknid is a chauffeur in Interzone, best known for
being both straight and unattached.

Beagle.
The Beagle is a drug addict who shoots up during the blue
(pornographic) movie at A.J.’s party.

Dr. Berger
Dr. Berger hosts a radio program in which he talks to sufferers of
various mental illnesses.

Brad
Brad is a gay man who moves to New York and becomes a jewelry
designer, eventually ripping off his clients to pay his gambling
debts.
Bradley the Buyer
Bradley the Buyer is an undercover narcotics agent in Mexico who
derives satisfaction from rubbing against his customers and
eventually bodily absorbs his boss.

Carl
Carl is a man who has a hallucinatory experience when he goes to
visit his friend Joselito in a sanitarium. He may or may not also be
Carl Peterson.

Carl Peterson
Carl Peterson, who may or may not be Joselito’s friend, is forced
to disclose his past homosexual experience under Dr. Benway’s
inquisition.

Clarence Cowie
Clarence Cowie is the subject of Dr. Berger’s experiment to
produce a “deanxietized man.” He transforms into a giant
centipede and is killed by the audience.
County Clerk The County Clerk is a racist and corrupt official in
Interzone.

Expeditor
The Expeditor escapes the humiliation of being president of the
Island near Interzone by changing his name and expediting
imports into Interzone.

Gimp
The Gimp is a junkie who turns informer. He is killed via a hot
shot, or a shot of poison passed off as heroin, as retribution.

Mr. Hyslop
Mr. Hyslop is A.J.’s secretary. He seems unenthusiastic, but he
goes along with A.J.’s antics.
Inspector The Inspector is interviewed by Your Reporter while he
applies ointment to treat pubic lice. He shakes the Reporter’s
hand with ointment still on his own hand.
Jane Jane is a prostitute in Mexico whose pimp forces his ideas on
her. She dies a year after she meets the narrator.

Jim
Jim is Brad’s partner who meets him in jail and gets revenge on
one of Brad’s former clients.

Joe
Joe is a café worker who sees the Sailor pick up a young man for
an exchange of sex and drugs.

Johnny
Johnny is one of the performers in the blue movie A.J. shows at
his annual party.

Joselito
Joselito is a young man who is diagnosed with tuberculosis and
sent to a sanitarium.

Leif
Leif is an importer cursed with terrible luck, trying to get a
shipment of K.Y. into Interzone.

Mark
Mark is one of the performers in the blue movie shown at A.J.’s
annual party.

Marvie
Marvie is an importer and exporter who gets involved with a
complicated deal to ship K.Y. into Interzon.

Mary
Mary is one of the performers in the blue movie shown at A.J.’s
annual party.

Miguel
Miguel visits the narrator shortly after having kicked his heroin
habit. The narrator finds his presence discomforting, as he is still
using at the time.

NG Joe
NG Joe suffers from Bang-utot, a disorder that makes him believe
his penis will kill him, so he uses heroin to prevent an erection.

Nick
Nick is the narrator’s drug dealer in New York.

O’Brien

O’Brien is one of the narcotics agents the narrator believes he

shoots in New York.

Party Leader
The Party Leader organizes riots and resistance in Interzone.

Doc Parker
Doc Parker is a pharmacist in Interzone who gossips with the
County Clerk.
Professor The Professor at Interzone University whips his
students into an animal-like frenzy.
THEMES

Drug Addiction
Drug addiction lies at the heart of Naked Lunch, which William S. Burroughs calls a "How-To Book"
in Chapter 24. The novel portrays the inner life of a drug addict, its very structure surreal and
nightmarish, reflecting this state of mind. The lengths to which addicts will go to get a fix is
portrayed in the desperate acts the characters commit in order to obtain drugs. This is usually some
kind of perfunctory sexual activity. They administer their drugs using whatever instruments and
means are necessary, and if their drug of choice is unavailable, they substitute one substance for
another. The vivid description of the Rube's waxy and decaying flesh in Chapter 3provides a clear
illustration of the effects these drugs have on their users. The boy in Chapter 20who is afflicted with
imaginary "coke bugs" highlights the desperation addicts face when a fix isn't readily available. Other
characters such as Bradley the Buyer show how addiction can take many forms. So do the subjects
of Dr. Benway's "experiments," driven to degrading behavior to slake their thirsts for their substance
of choice, whether sex, narcotics, or chocolate.

Sexuality as Addiction
The other primary addiction driving the characters in Naked Lunch is sex. The novel is filled with
increasingly lurid and disturbing descriptions of sexual activity in all forms. Although these
descriptions are presented in a repellent manner, they are also presented without judgment. These
activities would be readily censured by mainstream society—evidenced by the obscenity trials that
accompanied the novel's release. But within the world of the novel, they are just another part of that
world. Homosexual behavior figures prominently, notable because when the novel was written, gay
relationships were carefully hidden and conducted illicitly, often in dangerous circumstances. The
violent portrayals of sexual activity, such as A.J.'s blue (pornographic) movie and Hassan's orgy,
criticize the risks inherent in driving any kind of behavior underground. Sex and addiction are
intertwined in the bodies of the Mugwumps, whose penises secrete an addictive substance. Addicts
participate in demeaning sexual acts, devoid of pleasure or joy, because they are not able to live
openly with their addictions. These scenes also highlight the hypocrisy about sex in American
culture. While Americans may sexualize entertainment stars and produce pornography, they may
also hold strict, puritanical views of sexuality. The exaggerated portrayal of sex, and the repressed
American women who arrive at Hassan's rumpus room, illustrate how these restrictions are
psychologically destructive.

Government
In his 1991 essay "Afterthoughts on a Deposition," published with later editions of Naked Lunch,
William S. Burroughs reasserts narcotics addiction is the world's most pressing "public health
problem." He criticizes government-sanctioned solutions to this crisis, calling "anti-drug hysteria ... a
deadly threat to personal freedoms and due-process protections of the law everywhere." The text
of Naked Lunch reveals a strong distrust of governments and authority well before 1991. From the
first line of the novel—"I can feel the heat closing in"—Burroughs establishes an adversarial
relationship between the narrator and law enforcement. These officers are a menace to the narrator
and his acquaintances. They seek only to punish and maintain order, even though the narrator is
more a danger to himself than to others.
The narrator's skepticism about government ranges beyond day-to-day law enforcement. He
describes the president (presumably the president of the United States) as a junkie who engages in
homoerotic acts to get his fix. This isn't true in a literal sense, but it points to the president's (and
other government officials') addiction to power. Outside the United States, in the alternate realities
of Interzone and Freeland, the government is no better. Interzone is ruled by assorted political
parties, each of which is equally unappealing. They are all driven by a desire for absolute control over
the bodies and minds of the citizens. Only their means of control differ. The only representative of
the government of Freeland the reader sees closely is Dr. Benway. His sadistic cruelty in the name of
maintaining order—his treatments in the Reconditioning Center and his harassment of Carl Peterson
—reveals the ethos of Freeland's government. This is a country that kills its citizens' independence by
giving them everything and expecting a total surrender of liberty in return.

Medicine
Although government officials are menacing, the most villainous villains in Naked Lunch are
doctors. The government forces seeking to oppress citizens are, by and large, nameless and faceless
entities. But in contrast, the corrupt and cruel doctors are named and given specific character
development. Dr benway, the most prominent of these doctors, is actually both a physician and
government entity. He uses his skills to torture or "recondition" patients who don't conform to the
values mandated by the government and society of Freeland. Notably, this is not far removed from
actual treatments for homosexuality during the 19th and 20th centuries. He performs unnecessary
operations using unconventional methods, and he expresses no concern when patients die,
considering death just part of a day's work.
Dr. "Fingers" Shafer is another sinister doctor, revealed to have stood trial in the past for performing
"forcible lobotomy" on an untold number of patients. He conducts experiments on a man that
eventually turn him into a monstrous black centipede, which is destroyed by an angry mob. His
experiments indicate a sense of ambition and a desire to raise his profile and reputation. His forcible
lobotomies indicate a need for control. Moreover, they represent a criticism of the ubiquity of
lobotomies as a treatment for mental illness as well as "deviant" or "undesirable" behavior in the
1950s. Readers should note that until the late 20th century, homosexuality was treated as a mental
disorder in Western nations. This misunderstanding of mental illness is also visible in Dr. Berger's
radio show. Berger showcases the mentally ill for entertainment and treats nonmainstream behavior,
such as homosexuality and being a writer, as sicknesses as well.
The novel's criticism of the medical establishment may be the most personal, possibly stemming
from Burroughs own brief medical studies in Vienna in the 1940s. In 1956 Burroughs's "Letter from
a Master Addict to Dangerous Drugs" was published in the British Journal of Addiction. It is also
included in later editions of Naked Lunch. This letter criticizes the failure of medical professionals to
address drug addiction in an effective and nonpunitive way. The letter suggests the portrayal of
doctors in Naked Lunch may also reflect the inadequate treatment Burroughs experienced in his
efforts to end his addiction.