Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In an introduction, Burroughs observes that he wrote this heretofore unpublished picaresque novel in 1951, well before Naked Lunch established his reputation. He reveals that the book had its genesis in a terrible event: his accidental shooting to death of his wife, Joan, a tragedy that released the black wellsprings of his talent. The narrative recounts the hallucinatory life of William Lee, an American in Mexico City in the 1940s and his journey to Ecuador with his reluctant lover, Eugene Allerton, in search of the drug Yage. Lee is Burroughs after the killing, weighed down by guilt, drugs, lust and despair; seeking lethe. Admirerers will find an early exposition of Burroughs's later themes here, as well as a strain of gallows humor. The work is almost cinematic as it unfolds; the author is not yet experimenting with the meaninglessness of language, and, indeed it is thin in both thought and expression. This is the first of a series of Burroughs's works to be issued by Viking. Foreign rights: Andrew Wylie Agency. November (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Burroughs has contracted with Viking Penguin for seven books to be issued over the next five years. Queer , the first of these, was originally written in 1951, but has never before been published. Stylistically similar to Junky , it claims the same protagonist, Lee, who in this work is experiencing a period of intense withdrawal from heroin. He is disintegrated, unsure of himself and his purpose, given to emotional excess. He is obsessed with sex, yet even more craves attention. To satisfy this craving he invents rather frantic ``routines'' designed to shock and amuse his companions. While Queer may seem tame in comparison to Burroughs's later work, it is important for the insight it offers about his development as a writer. His lengthy introduction should be of particular interest to both readers and scholars. David W. Henderson, Eckerd Coll. Lib., St. Petersburg, Fla. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Written in 1952, Queer remained unprinted all these years, its publishers tell us, because of its ""candid homosexual content, and. . .its author's own reluctance to make public the painful events it recounts."" So now, in our latter-day age of liberation, we get to see it at last: a faded-trendy piece of 1950s hip arcana that preserves, if anything, a thin, petulant narcissism of feeling that might once upon a time have passed fleetingly for depth, however it may or may not be related to the development of the later Burroughs. Lee, American expatriate in Mexico City in the late 1940s, falls in love with the reluctant young Allerton, and, from the start, we're in for an affair that reads often now like one of the lesser forms of genre romance (""Lee watched the thin hands, the beautiful violet eyes, the flush of excitement on the boy's face""). As for feeling, we know it's deep, because the author says so, time and again, when Allerton holds back from Lee: ""Lee was deeply hurt""; ""Lee was depressed and shattered""; ""He felt a deep hurt. . . Tears ran down his face."" A ludicrous, comic-strip shorthand becomes more apparent in the narrative after Allerton agrees to serve as Lee's companion on a trip to South America, a trip that becomes a search for Yage, a thought-control drug: ""'A Colombian scientist who lives in Bogota isolated Telepathine from Yage. We must find that scientist.'"" Later, another clue takes them deep into the jungle: ""'A botanist! What a break. He is our man. We will go tomorrow.'"" What happens? The search for the drug is futile. Allerton drops Lee. Lee drifts back to Mexico City. Lee is cosmically sad. Burroughs explains in his introduction that all of this occurs while Lee is withdrawing from junk, and that's one reason (read the introduction to find out the other) why ""a smog of menace and evil rises from the pages"" of the book. It's a good thing he mentions the smog, so you'll be sure to notice it when you go back; what Burroughs doesn't do, though, is say much about why the book now reads so artificial, posed, thin, contrived, and silly, albeit with some effective travelogue footage. First printing of 30,000. Certainly more than enough. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
