Naked Lunch

Naked Lunch depicts a surreal odyssey that begins in New York City, stops off in different places throughout the U.S., crosses the southern border to Mexico, makes its way to the fictional states of Freeland and Interzone, and finally circles back again to New York City. Despite this winding global trajectory, the novel is rife with poignant and pointed commentary on American society. As the word “naked” in the title suggests, one of the aims of Naked Lunch is to expose, whether it be the sinister realities of drug addiction or a darker underbelly of American culture that well-to-do Americans “shut out” of “lifeproof houses.” 

Indeed, Burroughs takes a largely negative view of mainstream American culture, one that is grounded in a broader critique of Western capitalism and consumerism. In the chapter entitled “Ordinary Men and Women,” parodic depictions of an American Housewife and a Salesman highlight the ridiculousness of consumer culture, especially the obsession with needless products and absurd gadgets (such as the Octopus Kit for Massage Parlors). These passages reflect what Burroughs’s character Doctor Benway summarizes in an earlier chapter as “Western man’s” impulse to “externaliz[e] himself in the form of gadgets.” In this way, the novel not only rejects American materialism but also offers an indirect critique of the West’s preoccupation with technological and economic progress as a whole. 

Furthermore, mainstream America’s cultural obsession with wealth and consumerism informs Burroughs’s grim portrayals of the suburban landscape, which he describes as “a vast subdivision, antennae of television to a meaningless sky.” Not only does this description illustrate the way consumerism leads to conformity (all the houses look the same), but it also suggests that consumer culture is inherently devoid of meaning. For Burroughs, this way of life ultimately engenders feelings of heaviness, boredom, and longing, an effect that is encapsulated in his term “U.S. drag.” Burroughs’s even goes so far as to establish a link between “U.S. drag” and drug addiction, writing that “our habits build up with the drag.” In this regard, the novel suggests that there are deep-seated and negative consequences associated with the American way of life, which the novel depicts as ultimately meaningless and monotonous, based on mindless conformity and the accumulation of useless goods.