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23. Hauser and O’Brien
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Naked Lunch, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Drug Addiction
The Art of Writing
Politics, Power, and Control
American Society
The Medical-Industrial Complex
Summary
Analysis
The Atrophied Preface is narrated by the author Burroughs. The chapter opens with the question of why one would write such a story as Naked Lunch. Burroughs then introduces the idea of Lee The Agent getting clean. Immediately after, there is a flashback to Lee in Panama City with a man named Bill Gains, where they tried to score paregoric at the pharmacy. Gains ended up going back to Mexico, while Lee returned “to sex and pain and time and yagé.”
Much of Naked Lunch was inspired by the author William Burroughs’s experiences with addiction, and the “Atrophied Preface” confirms this. In this passage, in particular, Burroughs jumps in as the narrator and establishes the link between himself and the narrator of the novel Lee, whom he nicknames Lee The Agent. It is as though Lee is an alter-ego who represents Burroughs as an addict, which is why Burroughs refers to Lee and not himself in the Panama City memory with Bill Gains. Previous passages have established how addiction separates the user from the physical body and can often be characterized by a lack of interest in sex and a different relationship with time. Thus, Lee’s return to “sex and pain and time and yagé” signals his turning away from the hard drugs and reestablishment of a new way of relating to reality, which includes feelings the pain the drugs may have helped him suppress.
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Then the narrative jumps to somewhere around Tangier, as Burroughs recalls overdosing on majoun (dried cannabis ground into a fine powder and consumed in food). Burroughs remembers having no idea where or who he was at that time, and he has since tried to talk some sense into that “blighted young junky.” Now Burroughs supposes that that same young man is still there at that villa outside of Tanger. He is probably ingesting raw opium and doing other reckless things because he feels afraid that he “might lose something” if he doesn’t engage in these behaviors.
Looking back, Burroughs can see with clarity the suffering caused by his addiction. By referring to himself as a “blighted young junky,” he draws attention to the state of ruin his life was in, as well as to his relative inexperience at the time. He also knows that there is a young man who is just like he was in Tangier, participating in the same reckless behaviors for the same reasons: to escape a feeling of loss. In this way, Burroughs gestures to the foundational lack that underlies addiction, showing how addiction often serves as a coping mechanism for dealing with (or rather avoiding) feelings of lack.
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Burroughs shifts to talking about his approach to writing. He states generally that writers can only write about their perceptions in the present moment. In this regard, instead of “impos[ing] ‘story’ ‘plot’ ‘continuity,’” writing is more about “recording.” Abruptly Burroughs begins to talk how people are “possessed” when they do inexplicable things. He explains that he never feels possessed, nor does he feel “in possession” of his actions. Rather he has always kept himself together enough to “patrol” his behaviors and prevent himself from doing something stupid.
Then Burroughs’s reflections abruptly return to writing, specifically the way writers always like to evoke death’s smell. According to him, death does not have a smell. Death can rather more accurately be described as both having a specific smell and as being completely odorless.
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The narrative then jumps to a memory that takes place in Marrakech. In the memory, one of Burroughs’s friends finds himself naked on the second floor of a hotel and surrounded by three Arab men who are holding knives. He decides to jump out of a window to escape and sustains a fracture to his ankle. He then makes his way to the police station with a pink curtain wrapped around his naked body. The narrator contends that, at any moment, any of the different characters of Naked Lunch, could be recognized as the “naked junky in sunlight.”
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Burroughs then describes how a writer is always reading to themselves in the mirror, because they are constantly verifying to see that “The Crime of Separate Action” has not occurred. The Crime of Separate Action is when the reflection no longer obeys the brain. If the writer notices this happening, they can be sure they have lost control, and it is “too late.” What Burroughs has observed is that it is acceptable to express these deep, sometimes dark impulses through art, but one must not dare follow through in action in real life.
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Burroughs has also noticed that elected government officials systematically seek “the Death Penalty” for those who act on their impulses, who separate themselves from the pack, including drug addicts, sex fiends, and psychopaths. At the same time, diverse arms of the press collectively call for the eradication of what they call “the myth of other-level experience,” which is the idea that there is more to perceptual experience than what mainstream society claims
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Burroughs then abruptly shifts to discussing Naked Lunch. He explains that the novel was written so that the reader can begin it at any point. The book is meant to serve as “a blueprint” and “a How-To extend levels of experience.” Burroughs also explains that these extended levels of experience can only be accessed if the reader is silent. The narrative then jumps between a series of gruesome and unrelated scenes, including one involving Jack the Ripper, one alluding to a sex act performed by Johnny and Mary from the previously depicted pornographic film, and a gruesome murder committed by an “aging playboy” on his wife.
Abruptly, the scenes stop, and Burroughs reintroduces himself as “William Seward.” He declares himself to be the “captain” and vows to come to the rescue (of what, it is unclear). The narrative then launches again into disconnected passages, and the scenes are increasingly violent and incoherent. The transitions between each scene are abrupt, and the images flash across the pages in quick succession like scenes in a disorienting movie.
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The narrative tone suddenly changes again, and Burroughs begins to explain how the units of “The Word” are divided up into different parts. These parts may be consumed in any order, and, like the different parts of Naked Lunch, they can go in any direction and evoke different sensory experiences at once. Burroughs then addresses the reader again in the first-person as “William Seward.” He declares that he is unleashing his “word horde,” which he expects will work itself onto and into the reader by provoking very intense emotions.
Burroughs then imagines an American Tourist who would disapprove or feel uncomfortable with his writing project. He responds to this hypothetical American’s discomfort by explaining that his own drug addiction has cut him off from his emotions. Consequently, he doesn’t care what the American Tourist has to say. Burroughs then goes on to compare drug addicts to “The Dead,” as neither category of people cares what others think. He considers them both to be considered “Inscrutable.” The narrative then proceeds with more disconnected and slightly disturbing imagery. Burroughs signs off from Lola La Chata, México, D.F.
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