Queer

Queer

Set in Mexico City during the early 1950s, <i>Queer</i> follows William Lee's hopeless pursuit of desire from bar to bar in the American expatriate scene. As Lee breaks down, the trademark Burroughsian voice emerges, a maniacal mix of self-lacerating humor and the Ugly American at his ugliest.<br /><P><br />Originally written in 1952 but not published until 1985, <i>Queer</i> is an enigma—both an unflinching autobiographical self-portrait and a coruscatingly political novel, Burroughs' only realist love story and a montage of comic-grotesque fantasies that paved the way for his masterpiece, <i>Naked Lunch</i>.<br /><P><br />Edited from the original manuscripts and introduced by renowned Burroughs scholar Oliver Harris, <i>Queer</i> is a haunting tale of possession and exorcism, a key to the Burroughsian oeuvre, and a novel with a history of secrets.