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00:00:24,526 --> 00:00:26,111
I'm very pleased tonight...
2
00:00:26,194 --> 00:00:28,488
to introduce a man who,
in my opinion...
3
00:00:28,571 --> 00:00:31,282
is the greatest living
writer in America.
4
00:00:31,783 --> 00:00:35,370
Reading selections from
Naked Lunch and Nova Express...
5
00:00:35,453 --> 00:00:38,289
in his first television
appearance ever...
6
00:00:38,373 --> 00:00:41,418
here is Mr. William Burroughs!
[ Chuckles ]
7
00:00:41,501 --> 00:00:44,421
[ Applause ]
8
00:00:53,221 --> 00:00:56,808
Twilight's last gleamings.
9
00:00:56,891 --> 00:01:00,770
SS America off Jersey coast.
10
00:01:01,312 --> 00:01:06,568
Uh, ladies and gentlemen,
there is no cause for alarm.
11
00:01:06,651 --> 00:01:09,487
We have a minor problem
in the boiler room...
12
00:01:09,571 --> 00:01:13,825
but everything is now under—
13
00:01:14,492 --> 00:01:15,994
[ Laughter ]
14
00:01:16,077 --> 00:01:18,580
- Sound effects of a nuclear blast.
- [ Explosion ]
15
00:01:18,663 --> 00:01:21,291
The explosion splits the boat.
16
00:01:21,374 --> 00:01:24,252
[ Explosion Continues ]
17
00:01:25,170 --> 00:01:28,089
Dr. Benway, ship's doctor...
18
00:01:28,173 --> 00:01:32,093
drunkenly added two inches
to a four-inch incision...
19
00:01:32,177 --> 00:01:34,804
with one stroke of his scalpel.
20
00:01:35,346 --> 00:01:39,017
"Perhaps the appendix is already out,
Doctor," the nurse said...
21
00:01:39,100 --> 00:01:41,060
- peering dubiously over his shoulder.
- [ Laughter ]
22
00:01:41,144 --> 00:01:43,104
"I saw a little scar."
23
00:01:43,813 --> 00:01:46,232
"The appendix out?
24
00:01:46,816 --> 00:01:48,610
I'm taking the appendix out!
25
00:01:48,693 --> 00:01:51,029
What do you think I'm doing here?"
26
00:01:51,529 --> 00:01:53,698
"Perhaps the appendix is
on the left side, Doctor.
27
00:01:53,782 --> 00:01:57,619
That happens sometimes,
you know."
28
00:01:57,702 --> 00:02:01,289
"Stop breathing down my neck!
I'm coming to that.
29
00:02:01,372 --> 00:02:04,626
Don't you think
I know where an appendix is?
30
00:02:04,709 --> 00:02:09,214
I studied appendectomy
in 1904 at Harvard."
31
00:02:09,798 --> 00:02:13,968
He lifts the abdominal wall
and searches along the incision...
32
00:02:14,052 --> 00:02:15,970
dropping ashes from his cigarette.
33
00:02:16,054 --> 00:02:17,722
[ Laughter ]
34
00:02:17,806 --> 00:02:21,726
"And get me a new scalpel.
This one's got no edge to it."
35
00:02:21,810 --> 00:02:25,188
- He thrusts a red fist at her.
- [ Explosion ]
36
00:02:25,271 --> 00:02:28,900
The doctor reels back
and flattens against the wall...
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00:02:28,983 --> 00:02:30,693
a bloody scalpel clutched in one hand.
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00:02:30,777 --> 00:02:32,445
♪♪ [ "The Star-spangled Banner" ]
39
00:02:32,570 --> 00:02:37,617
The patient slides
off the operating table,
spilling intestines across the floor.
40
00:02:37,700 --> 00:02:40,161
[ Laughter ]
41
00:02:40,245 --> 00:02:45,917
Dr. Benway sweeps instruments,
cocaine and morphine into his satchel.
42
00:02:46,543 --> 00:02:50,839
"Sew her up. I can't be expected
to work under such conditions."
43
00:02:50,922 --> 00:02:52,507
♪♪ [ Continues ]
44
00:02:52,590 --> 00:02:55,009
Dr. Benway pushed through
a crowd at the rail...
45
00:02:55,093 --> 00:02:56,928
and boarded the first lifeboat.
46
00:02:57,595 --> 00:03:02,225
"Y'all all right?" he says,
seating himself among the women.
47
00:03:03,101 --> 00:03:05,436
"I'm the doctor."
48
00:03:06,938 --> 00:03:10,149
[ Applause ]
49
00:03:13,278 --> 00:03:16,072
♪♪ [ Ends ]
50
00:03:18,616 --> 00:03:21,828
♪♪ [ Swing ]
51
00:03:54,736 --> 00:03:57,697
♪♪ [ Continues ]
52
00:04:27,226 --> 00:04:30,146
I remember one thing about him,
that he kept ferrets in his room.
53
00:04:30,229 --> 00:04:34,817
He was the only Harvard student
that had ferrets as pets.
54
00:04:34,901 --> 00:04:37,612
And I admit, I couldn't
imagine having such things...
55
00:04:37,695 --> 00:04:39,697
but there was Bill
and there were the ferrets.
56
00:04:40,490 --> 00:04:43,660
I didn't feel at all comfortable
with Bill.
57
00:04:43,743 --> 00:04:47,330
My first thought was,
"Man, this guy's gotta be heat."
58
00:04:47,413 --> 00:04:49,791
William is, like,
never sees anybody...
59
00:04:49,874 --> 00:04:51,876
never goes out,
hates parties...
60
00:04:51,960 --> 00:04:56,631
and-and lives a completely
enclosed — enclosed life, you know?
61
00:04:56,714 --> 00:04:59,884
William would make a great prisoner.
62
00:04:59,968 --> 00:05:01,552
You know?
I mean in solitary.
63
00:05:01,636 --> 00:05:05,640
He, uh, bewilders me
just a little bit, even now.
64
00:05:06,265 --> 00:05:09,310
There's no one more — He's
up there with the pope, you know?
65
00:05:09,394 --> 00:05:12,271
You-You can't revere him enough,
you know?
66
00:05:12,355 --> 00:05:15,358
He's one of the greatest minds
of our times, you know?
67
00:05:15,441 --> 00:05:17,151
You wouldn't know shit
about Burroughs...
68
00:05:17,235 --> 00:05:21,030
unless you knew him for a long time
and through various crises...
69
00:05:21,114 --> 00:05:23,324
to see how he responded,
how he acted.
70
00:05:23,408 --> 00:05:25,118
Well, Kerouac said
that Burroughs was...
71
00:05:25,201 --> 00:05:26,911
the most intelligent man
in America.
72
00:05:26,995 --> 00:05:28,830
I probably repeated that
a million times.
73
00:05:28,913 --> 00:05:32,750
He's a hard guy to get into bed.
That's why I like him, I think.
74
00:05:36,254 --> 00:05:41,634
I was born February 5, 1914,
in Saint Louis, Missouri.
75
00:05:42,427 --> 00:05:47,015
As a young child, uh,
I wanted to be a writer...
76
00:05:47,098 --> 00:05:50,893
and I wrote descriptions
of corn dances in New Mexico...
77
00:05:50,977 --> 00:05:53,730
that were much praised
by my English teachers.
78
00:05:53,813 --> 00:05:55,815
But it was many years...
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00:05:55,898 --> 00:05:59,736
before I came back to any —
even any attempts to write.
80
00:05:59,819 --> 00:06:03,656
I thought that
they led very glamorous lives...
81
00:06:03,740 --> 00:06:07,994
uh, living in Tangiers
and smoking hashish...
82
00:06:08,077 --> 00:06:10,788
and sniffing cocaine in Mayfair.
83
00:06:11,289 --> 00:06:13,708
It struck me as being
a very glamorous...
84
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and easy and pleasant life.
85
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Little did I know.
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00:06:18,379 --> 00:06:20,715
♪♪ [ Psychedelic Jazz ]
87
00:06:49,452 --> 00:06:51,746
[ No Audible Dialogue ]
88
00:07:00,630 --> 00:07:02,882
♪♪ [ Man Singing, Indistinct ]
89
00:07:12,391 --> 00:07:13,893
♪♪ [ Fades ]
90
00:07:13,976 --> 00:07:17,271
"When Kim was 15,
his father allowed him
to withdraw from the school...
91
00:07:17,355 --> 00:07:19,607
because he was so unhappy there...
92
00:07:19,690 --> 00:07:21,192
and so much disliked...
93
00:07:21,275 --> 00:07:23,444
by the other boys and their parents.
94
00:07:23,528 --> 00:07:27,031
'I don't want that boy
in the house again,'
said Colonel Greenfield.
95
00:07:27,115 --> 00:07:29,617
'He looks like a sheep-killin' dog.'
96
00:07:31,077 --> 00:07:33,079
'It is a walking corpse'...
97
00:07:33,162 --> 00:07:37,125
said a Saint Louis
matron poisonously.
98
00:07:37,208 --> 00:07:40,837
Years later,
Kim settled that account.
99
00:07:40,920 --> 00:07:43,297
When informed of her death,
he said...
100
00:07:43,381 --> 00:07:48,136
'Well, it isn't every corpse
that can walk. Hers can't.'"
101
00:07:48,219 --> 00:07:49,720
[ Laughter ]
102
00:07:49,804 --> 00:07:54,684
"'The boy is rotten clear through,
and he stinks like a polecat'...
103
00:07:54,767 --> 00:07:57,478
Judge Farris pontificated.
104
00:07:57,562 --> 00:07:59,689
Now this was true.
105
00:07:59,772 --> 00:08:02,441
When angered
or aroused or excited...
106
00:08:02,525 --> 00:08:04,652
Kim flushed bright red...
107
00:08:04,735 --> 00:08:09,824
and steamed off a rank,
ruttish animal smell.
108
00:08:10,741 --> 00:08:12,952
'The child is not wholesome'...
109
00:08:13,035 --> 00:08:16,706
said Mr. Kindhart
with his usual restraint.
110
00:08:17,498 --> 00:08:21,002
Kim remembers
his father's last words.
111
00:08:21,752 --> 00:08:25,590
'Stay out of churches, Son.
112
00:08:25,673 --> 00:08:30,511
And don't ever let a priest near you
when you're dying.
113
00:08:30,595 --> 00:08:34,891
[ Clears Throat ]
All they got a key to is the shit house.
114
00:08:35,725 --> 00:08:41,189
And swear to me you will never
wear a policeman's badge.'"
115
00:08:42,106 --> 00:08:44,650
[ No Audible Dialogue ]
116
00:08:44,734 --> 00:08:47,403
[ Burroughs ] I never felt
that I really belonged at all...
117
00:08:47,486 --> 00:08:51,532
in the whole Saint Louis,
uh, social structure.
118
00:08:51,616 --> 00:08:54,452
There was just
something wrong there.
119
00:08:55,119 --> 00:08:57,239
[ Burroughs ] Now there's —
This is, uh — Corner wall.
120
00:08:57,288 --> 00:09:00,124
Now that's Dr. Senseney's old house.
121
00:09:00,208 --> 00:09:01,959
It was his wife...
122
00:09:02,043 --> 00:09:05,546
who said about me that
I looked like a walking corpse.
123
00:09:05,630 --> 00:09:07,089
[ Man Chuckles ]
124
00:09:07,173 --> 00:09:10,718
Uh, years later when I heard
that she had died, I said...
125
00:09:10,801 --> 00:09:14,472
"It isn't every corpse that can walk.
Hers can't."
126
00:09:14,555 --> 00:09:19,393
"I can divide my literary production
into sets.
127
00:09:19,477 --> 00:09:24,732
Where, when and under
what circumstances produced.
128
00:09:25,608 --> 00:09:29,278
[ Burroughs Continues ] The first set
is a street of red brick houses...
129
00:09:29,362 --> 00:09:34,951
with slate roofs, lawns in front
and large backyards.
130
00:09:35,034 --> 00:09:39,497
The address is
4664 Pershing Avenue...
131
00:09:39,580 --> 00:09:42,375
and the house is still there."
132
00:09:49,382 --> 00:09:51,217
Do you wanna stroll over there?
133
00:09:51,300 --> 00:09:53,177
You see —
You can see all the rooms.
134
00:09:53,261 --> 00:09:55,429
See the little room
to the side there?
135
00:09:55,513 --> 00:09:57,181
That was my father's study.
136
00:09:57,265 --> 00:10:01,102
[ Burroughs ] Nothing here
but the smell of empty years.
137
00:10:01,185 --> 00:10:03,854
How many years?
I can't be sure.
138
00:10:04,522 --> 00:10:06,899
I remember a dream
of my childhood.
139
00:10:06,983 --> 00:10:09,110
I am in a beautiful garden.
140
00:10:09,193 --> 00:10:11,779
As I reach out to touch the flowers...
141
00:10:11,862 --> 00:10:15,032
they wither under my hands.
142
00:10:15,574 --> 00:10:18,619
I wonder whatever happened
to Otto's boy...
143
00:10:18,703 --> 00:10:20,788
who played the violin.
144
00:10:20,871 --> 00:10:23,332
[ Man ] You had —
Otto was your gardener here even?
145
00:10:23,416 --> 00:10:25,418
Yes, and he went with us
to Price Road.
146
00:10:25,501 --> 00:10:28,296
I see. Did you know him a lot
when you were a little kid?
147
00:10:28,379 --> 00:10:30,298
- Oh, yes.
- Older man, a black man.
148
00:10:30,381 --> 00:10:35,011
All the time I was out talking
to him because, um...
149
00:10:36,512 --> 00:10:39,807
you know, he was gardening there
and I was out looking at the flowers...
150
00:10:39,890 --> 00:10:41,892
and I had my pet toad.
151
00:10:41,976 --> 00:10:44,770
When I would be working...
152
00:10:44,854 --> 00:10:49,150
he — he would come out and help me.
153
00:10:49,233 --> 00:10:52,153
- [ Laughing ]
- You know, he was — he was like this.
154
00:10:52,236 --> 00:10:56,449
- But he would come out and —
- That's true, yeah.
155
00:10:56,532 --> 00:11:00,244
try to help me, you know,
to have my work done.
156
00:11:00,953 --> 00:11:03,331
And I had a boy...
157
00:11:04,040 --> 00:11:09,712
and-and I-I got all
their clothes to clothe him.
158
00:11:09,795 --> 00:11:12,381
- [ Man ] How old is your son?
- [ Woman ] Oh, he's dead now.
159
00:11:12,465 --> 00:11:15,343
- He is —
- [ Woman ] He died in '52.
160
00:11:15,426 --> 00:11:17,928
He has been dead a long time.
161
00:11:18,429 --> 00:11:20,389
He played the violin, I remember.
162
00:11:20,473 --> 00:11:23,559
That's — That's right.
He can remember.
163
00:11:23,642 --> 00:11:26,687
- He-He played —
- His name was Harold.
164
00:11:26,771 --> 00:11:29,732
- Harold! He remembers.
- [ Woman Chuckles ]
165
00:11:29,815 --> 00:11:32,193
Yes, his name was Harold.
166
00:11:33,069 --> 00:11:38,407
As I recall in, uh, 1958, '59...
167
00:11:38,491 --> 00:11:41,577
I wrote — when I was writing
Naked Lunch, I wrote a line:
168
00:11:41,660 --> 00:11:45,873
"I wonder whatever happened
to Otto's boy who played the violin."
169
00:11:45,956 --> 00:11:49,001
Well, I had a sort of a premonition
at that point that he was dead...
170
00:11:49,085 --> 00:11:52,797
and I asked about it
in my next letter to Otto...
171
00:11:52,880 --> 00:11:54,632
and he told me that, uh...
172
00:11:54,715 --> 00:11:59,261
Harold had died in 1952,
St. Luke's Hospital.
173
00:11:59,345 --> 00:12:01,639
He did not say from what cause.
174
00:12:03,599 --> 00:12:06,519
Now we had
an old Irish crone living here...
175
00:12:06,602 --> 00:12:08,854
working here for a while...
176
00:12:08,938 --> 00:12:11,482
who taught me
how to call the toads.
177
00:12:12,358 --> 00:12:16,112
And I could come out here
and call a toad.
178
00:12:16,195 --> 00:12:19,740
There was a toad who lived
under a rock right by the pool...
179
00:12:19,824 --> 00:12:22,660
and he'd come hopping out
right to my feet.
180
00:12:22,743 --> 00:12:24,870
- Familiar.
- [ Man ] Uh-huh.
181
00:12:24,954 --> 00:12:28,249
- How was this toad called?
- I don't remember.
182
00:12:28,332 --> 00:12:30,334
It was a little sound.
183
00:12:31,752 --> 00:12:33,754
You could hardly hear it,
sort of a hum.
184
00:12:33,838 --> 00:12:36,757
[ Humming ]
185
00:12:37,716 --> 00:12:39,677
You'd sort of move around...
186
00:12:40,261 --> 00:12:42,096
and then you'd zero in.
187
00:12:42,179 --> 00:12:44,140
Now you've got the toad.
188
00:12:44,640 --> 00:12:48,769
- There he is, and out he comes.
- Uh-huh.
189
00:12:48,853 --> 00:12:52,606
A lost art,
calling — calling the toads.
190
00:12:52,690 --> 00:12:54,191
Yeah.
191
00:12:55,359 --> 00:12:56,861
This porch was here.
192
00:12:56,944 --> 00:12:58,946
Now one of the pictures
that we have...
193
00:12:59,029 --> 00:13:01,615
of me and my brother together
in Western clothes...
194
00:13:01,699 --> 00:13:04,326
was taken on that porch.
195
00:13:07,705 --> 00:13:09,623
I'm sure that's Dad.
196
00:13:09,707 --> 00:13:12,460
- Yeah.
- It looks just like him.
197
00:13:13,878 --> 00:13:15,963
Well, I don't know who this is.
198
00:13:16,046 --> 00:13:18,424
Do you know who this is?
Any idea?
199
00:13:18,507 --> 00:13:21,135
- [ Burroughs Murmuring ]
- It says "Mortimer Perry Burroughs."
200
00:13:21,218 --> 00:13:23,220
So maybe it's Dad
when he was young.
201
00:13:23,304 --> 00:13:26,390
Uh, yes, I think it probably is.
202
00:13:31,103 --> 00:13:32,605
Weird.
203
00:13:32,688 --> 00:13:37,485
The whole family story
of my father's side,
it gets very, very shady.
204
00:13:37,568 --> 00:13:39,653
[ Man ]
What kind of man was your father?
205
00:13:39,737 --> 00:13:43,073
[ Burroughs ]
He was very mysterious, very reticent.
206
00:13:43,741 --> 00:13:45,201
The only thing he told me was...
207
00:13:45,284 --> 00:13:50,372
that he was beaten
if he ever went into his father's study...
208
00:13:50,456 --> 00:13:53,626
or disturbed his father
while he was working.
209
00:13:53,709 --> 00:13:56,170
That he had very little time
for the children.
210
00:13:56,253 --> 00:13:58,464
That was the impression I had.
211
00:13:59,131 --> 00:14:02,009
My grandfather invented
the Burroughs adding machine...
212
00:14:02,092 --> 00:14:04,678
and founded
the Burroughs Corporation.
213
00:14:04,762 --> 00:14:08,432
The family shares would be worth
$60 million today...
214
00:14:08,516 --> 00:14:11,477
but the family sold out
for a fraction of that...
215
00:14:11,560 --> 00:14:13,938
so I never got a penny from it.
216
00:14:15,147 --> 00:14:16,899
[ Man ]
What did your mother look like?
217
00:14:17,441 --> 00:14:19,944
Oh, she was, uh, she was thin.
218
00:14:20,027 --> 00:14:22,071
She had a thin face.
219
00:14:22,154 --> 00:14:26,283
She had a very spiritual,
a very ethereal face.
220
00:14:27,284 --> 00:14:31,622
She had a great, um,
sort of instinct about people...
221
00:14:32,122 --> 00:14:33,958
and we were quite chummy.
222
00:14:34,041 --> 00:14:37,419
- Your mother and you?
- Yes, oh, very.
223
00:14:38,087 --> 00:14:41,966
Oh, Grandma,
she'd had about 13 kids.
224
00:14:42,550 --> 00:14:44,260
This grim old woman who said...
225
00:14:44,343 --> 00:14:48,222
"I'd rather see a son of mine
come home dead than drunk."
226
00:14:48,305 --> 00:14:51,517
And all her sons were
these alcoholics, you know?
227
00:14:51,600 --> 00:14:53,060
[ Man Laughing ]
228
00:14:53,143 --> 00:14:56,897
Oh, Grandmother,
oh, Grandmother, what the fuck?
229
00:14:56,981 --> 00:14:58,691
And her husband —
230
00:14:58,774 --> 00:15:02,111
She-She kept forgetting
her husband's intemperance.
231
00:15:02,194 --> 00:15:05,573
- [ Chuckling ]
Her husband drank, it seems.
- Another drunk.
232
00:15:05,656 --> 00:15:08,576
Yes. Yes, indeed.
It's in the family.
233
00:15:08,659 --> 00:15:10,619
[ Both Chuckling ]
234
00:15:12,454 --> 00:15:14,164
That is me.
235
00:15:15,332 --> 00:15:17,001
It's one of the, uh —
236
00:15:17,668 --> 00:15:19,920
"William Seward Burroughs."
237
00:15:21,005 --> 00:15:24,925
Well, that must be Laura Belle.
That's when we were very young.
238
00:15:25,009 --> 00:15:28,679
You've got a sweet,
angelic expression there, Mort.
239
00:15:28,762 --> 00:15:31,562
- [ Mortimer ]
You looked pretty cute yourself.
- [ Burroughs Chuckles ]
240
00:15:32,600 --> 00:15:36,061
I tried to read Naked Lunch.
I read halfway through it
and I pitched it.
241
00:15:36,145 --> 00:15:39,773
It-It didn't make much sense to me.
242
00:15:39,857 --> 00:15:41,650
And, frankly, it didn't appeal to me.
243
00:15:41,734 --> 00:15:45,946
I didn't see any real necessity
for the language he used.
244
00:15:46,030 --> 00:15:49,325
I know he was using it
for the shock, uh, purpose.
245
00:15:49,992 --> 00:15:52,745
But, uh, to me, it doesn't do that.
246
00:15:52,828 --> 00:15:54,371
[ Man ]
Mm-hmm.
247
00:15:55,706 --> 00:15:57,207
It just sort of disgusts me.
248
00:16:00,044 --> 00:16:03,130
Well, this was the bedroom
that I shared with Morty.
249
00:16:03,213 --> 00:16:06,800
As a child I was very much
afraid of the dark...
250
00:16:06,884 --> 00:16:08,594
and afraid to be alone...
251
00:16:09,178 --> 00:16:11,096
particularly at night.
252
00:16:11,180 --> 00:16:14,099
So I preferred to have someone
in the room with me.
253
00:16:15,809 --> 00:16:18,646
Sometimes when we were out
at the other place, I remember...
254
00:16:18,729 --> 00:16:20,314
if my parents were out...
255
00:16:20,397 --> 00:16:23,525
the butler would have to come up
and sit in my room...
256
00:16:24,234 --> 00:16:27,237
and if Mort was out,
until Mort came home.
257
00:16:29,198 --> 00:16:30,991
Yes, I was afraid of the dark.
258
00:16:31,075 --> 00:16:33,911
I was afraid of lightning,
all these things.
259
00:16:34,912 --> 00:16:37,706
They don't bother me anymore.
[ Clears Throat ]
260
00:16:38,540 --> 00:16:42,002
[ Burroughs ]
You begin to see there is no boy
there in the dark room.
261
00:16:44,588 --> 00:16:47,424
He was looking at something
a long time ago.
262
00:16:47,508 --> 00:16:49,009
♪♪ [ Jazz ]
263
00:16:49,093 --> 00:16:51,178
Changed place, sad image...
264
00:16:51,261 --> 00:16:53,222
circulates through
backwards time.
265
00:16:54,264 --> 00:16:59,269
Dead young flesh and stale
underwear. Bending sex words.
266
00:16:59,353 --> 00:17:02,773
Little Blue Books.
Adventure stories.
267
00:17:02,856 --> 00:17:04,650
Coming of Age in Samoa...
268
00:17:04,733 --> 00:17:07,736
The Book of Knowledge
and Dorian Gray.
269
00:17:07,820 --> 00:17:10,030
♪♪ [ Continues ]
270
00:17:10,114 --> 00:17:13,701
Music of East St. Louis.
Toodle-oo.
271
00:17:13,784 --> 00:17:16,954
Warm spring wind blows
faded pink curtains...
272
00:17:17,037 --> 00:17:18,706
in through the open window.
273
00:17:18,789 --> 00:17:21,375
A child reads a letter.
274
00:17:21,458 --> 00:17:25,129
"Dear Mom and Dad,
I am going to join the wild boys.
275
00:17:25,212 --> 00:17:29,383
When you read this,
I will be far away."
276
00:17:29,466 --> 00:17:34,221
[ Burroughs ] Well, all these, um,
experiences from my childhood...
277
00:17:34,304 --> 00:17:36,890
typical of Saint Louis in the '20s...
278
00:17:36,974 --> 00:17:40,436
and any Midwestern town
in the '20s...
279
00:17:40,519 --> 00:17:43,981
actually was a very important
source material for my books.
280
00:17:44,064 --> 00:17:48,444
It's found in — in every book actually.
281
00:17:48,527 --> 00:17:50,738
In Junkie, in Naked Lunch...
282
00:17:50,821 --> 00:17:54,158
in The Wild Boys, Exterminator!
283
00:17:54,241 --> 00:17:55,826
- You've —
- A recurrent theme.
284
00:17:55,909 --> 00:17:58,871
You've said that a lot of your work,
or almost all your work...
285
00:17:58,954 --> 00:18:00,748
is essentially autobiographical.
286
00:18:00,831 --> 00:18:03,083
Yes, anyone's is.
[ Murmuring ]
287
00:18:03,167 --> 00:18:05,419
Do you ever wish
you could go back to live then...
288
00:18:05,502 --> 00:18:07,588
live here again back in the early '20s?
289
00:18:07,671 --> 00:18:09,923
Oh, that's a recurrent, um...
290
00:18:10,007 --> 00:18:15,095
a recurrent theme
in many, many books...
291
00:18:15,179 --> 00:18:18,515
- of people going back to another era.
- Mmm.
292
00:18:19,725 --> 00:18:21,435
Yeah, yes, well, I don't —
293
00:18:21,518 --> 00:18:25,105
It just, uh, it just won't work.
That's all.
294
00:18:26,523 --> 00:18:28,484
You can't get there.
295
00:18:31,069 --> 00:18:34,031
Now if you can,
certainly only as a spectator.
296
00:18:35,365 --> 00:18:40,454
At 15, I was sent to Los Alamos
Ranch School for my health...
297
00:18:40,537 --> 00:18:42,331
where they later made
the atom bomb.
298
00:18:42,414 --> 00:18:46,043
It seemed so right somehow,
like the school song.
299
00:18:46,126 --> 00:18:49,129
♪ Far away
and high on the mesa's crest ♪
300
00:18:49,213 --> 00:18:53,133
♪ Here's the life
that all of us love the best ♪♪
301
00:18:53,717 --> 00:18:57,137
Far away
and high on the mesa's crest...
302
00:18:57,221 --> 00:18:59,681
I was forced to become a Boy Scout...
303
00:18:59,765 --> 00:19:01,892
exercise before breakfast...
304
00:19:01,975 --> 00:19:07,314
and ride a stubborn, spiteful,
recalcitrant horse.
305
00:19:07,397 --> 00:19:12,653
I formed a romantic attachment
to one of the boys at Los Alamos...
306
00:19:12,736 --> 00:19:15,697
and kept a diary of this affair...
307
00:19:15,781 --> 00:19:19,993
that was to put me off writing
for many years.
308
00:19:20,077 --> 00:19:24,832
I persuaded my family
to let me remain in Saint Louis...
309
00:19:24,915 --> 00:19:28,919
so my things were packed
and sent to me from the school.
310
00:19:29,461 --> 00:19:31,922
And I used to turn cold...
311
00:19:32,005 --> 00:19:36,969
thinking maybe the boys are
reading it aloud to each other.
312
00:19:37,678 --> 00:19:40,180
When the box finally arrived...
313
00:19:40,264 --> 00:19:43,892
I pried it open
and threw everything out...
314
00:19:43,976 --> 00:19:48,397
until I found the diary
and destroyed it forthwith...
315
00:19:48,480 --> 00:19:52,609
without even a glance
at those appalling pages.
316
00:19:53,861 --> 00:19:57,155
This still happens
from time to time.
317
00:19:57,239 --> 00:20:01,201
I will write something
I think is good at the time...
318
00:20:01,285 --> 00:20:03,203
and looking at it later, I say...
319
00:20:03,287 --> 00:20:06,957
"My God,
tear it into very small pieces...
320
00:20:07,040 --> 00:20:10,460
and throw it
into somebody else's garbage can."
321
00:20:11,920 --> 00:20:13,672
After graduating from Harvard...
322
00:20:13,755 --> 00:20:17,968
I studied medicine in Vienna
for about six months...
323
00:20:18,051 --> 00:20:22,264
when the war broke out in 1942.
324
00:20:22,764 --> 00:20:26,268
I was in the army
for about six months...
325
00:20:26,351 --> 00:20:28,395
discharged.
326
00:20:28,478 --> 00:20:32,649
In 1944, I met Jack Kerouac...
327
00:20:32,733 --> 00:20:35,944
Joan Vollmer, Allen Ginsberg...
328
00:20:36,028 --> 00:20:38,864
and also, um, Herbert Huncke...
329
00:20:38,947 --> 00:20:43,577
and some of the characters
that later appear in Junkie.
330
00:20:43,660 --> 00:20:49,082
[ Man ] I know Allen and Greg
and, uh, and Kerouac...
331
00:20:49,166 --> 00:20:54,129
and they all spoke of him
as the sort of daddy...
332
00:20:54,212 --> 00:20:55,714
big daddy.
333
00:20:55,797 --> 00:21:00,093
Bull. Jack called him Bull.
334
00:21:00,677 --> 00:21:06,516
Everything that Jack says is
to be taken with,
uh, considerable reserve.
335
00:21:06,600 --> 00:21:08,852
He was always writing fiction...
336
00:21:09,353 --> 00:21:12,564
and, uh, he liked to think of me
as a teacher.
337
00:21:12,648 --> 00:21:15,317
He pushed these categories
onto people.
338
00:21:15,400 --> 00:21:19,613
Now you're going to be a teacher,
and you're going to be whatever.
339
00:21:19,696 --> 00:21:24,493
So I don't think they're to be taken,
um, too seriously, but I —
340
00:21:24,576 --> 00:21:26,662
Well, I turned him on
to some books...
341
00:21:26,745 --> 00:21:30,791
Spengler and on to Céline.
342
00:21:30,874 --> 00:21:33,752
You know what line of yours
Kerouac liked the best?
343
00:21:33,835 --> 00:21:35,462
What?
344
00:21:35,545 --> 00:21:37,005
"Motel, motel, motel.
345
00:21:37,089 --> 00:21:42,135
Loneliness moans
across the still, oily tidal waters
of an East Texas bayou."
346
00:21:42,219 --> 00:21:44,471
- You remember? Is there —
Do you know that?
- Yes, yes.
347
00:21:44,554 --> 00:21:46,848
He wrote me a letter
and then he spoke about it.
348
00:21:46,932 --> 00:21:49,351
He said that that was
the first time he dug your prose...
349
00:21:49,434 --> 00:21:51,812
because of your ear as a musician.
350
00:21:51,895 --> 00:21:54,856
- [ Continues, Indistinct ]
- [ Southern ] They were quick
to pick up on his work...
351
00:21:54,940 --> 00:21:58,110
because of its unique and...
352
00:21:59,361 --> 00:22:02,572
you know, obviously great qualities.
353
00:22:03,156 --> 00:22:08,161
And so they're in-in,
you know, "geniusville."
354
00:22:08,245 --> 00:22:12,666
On 115th Street, in the apartment
we shared with Joan and Jack...
355
00:22:12,749 --> 00:22:17,254
do you remember when
we played out routines at that time?
356
00:22:17,337 --> 00:22:19,923
Do you remember the characters?
357
00:22:20,007 --> 00:22:22,384
Uh, well, I remember some of them.
358
00:22:22,467 --> 00:22:25,012
You-You played
the well-groomed Hungarian.
359
00:22:25,095 --> 00:22:27,848
[ European Accent ] Yes, my dear.
I was the well-groomed Hungarian...
360
00:22:27,931 --> 00:22:30,559
and I am still here with you now...
361
00:22:30,642 --> 00:22:32,436
and I have been wanting to know...
362
00:22:32,519 --> 00:22:36,023
do you by any chance
have some shade of recollection...
363
00:22:36,106 --> 00:22:40,485
of the, uh, personage that you
yourself identified in those days?
364
00:22:40,569 --> 00:22:44,740
Um, I think
I was playing sort of a, um...
365
00:22:44,823 --> 00:22:46,658
an Edith Sitwell part.
366
00:22:46,742 --> 00:22:48,201
Mmm, quite right, yes.
367
00:22:48,285 --> 00:22:49,786
I got in drag...
368
00:22:49,870 --> 00:22:54,666
and I looked like
some sinister old lesbian.
369
00:22:54,750 --> 00:22:58,086
I do believe you-you also affected
the title of a baroness?
370
00:22:58,170 --> 00:22:59,838
Uh, definitely, yes.
371
00:22:59,921 --> 00:23:03,341
And-And do you remember the liaison
that we had...
372
00:23:03,425 --> 00:23:07,471
to bring the foolish, rich, young...
373
00:23:07,554 --> 00:23:11,475
ruddy-cheeked American
to my art gallery?
374
00:23:11,975 --> 00:23:13,935
Oh, of course, yes.
375
00:23:14,019 --> 00:23:18,857
You know, Americans, they are
so full with money, it is a duty.
376
00:23:18,940 --> 00:23:21,693
Yes, it is for the very choice
American you brought.
377
00:23:21,777 --> 00:23:24,905
So relieve them of a little bit, huh?
378
00:23:24,988 --> 00:23:27,324
- He had a straw hat.
Do you remember this?
- Yes, yes.
379
00:23:27,407 --> 00:23:30,452
What was that magic name
30 years ago?
380
00:23:30,535 --> 00:23:33,538
- He was an American
named Kerouac.
- Yes.
381
00:23:33,622 --> 00:23:36,374
He was a nice boy, very nice boy.
382
00:23:36,458 --> 00:23:38,210
He was a writer,
a very good writer.
383
00:23:38,293 --> 00:23:40,587
- A good writer.
- Very good writer, very American.
384
00:23:40,670 --> 00:23:44,299
Later he became quite well known,
I'm given to understand.
385
00:23:44,382 --> 00:23:46,802
- Very famous.
- Very famous.
386
00:23:46,885 --> 00:23:50,138
He wrote some book called
On the Route I think.
387
00:23:50,222 --> 00:23:52,682
- [ Ginsberg ] En Route. En Route.
- En Route.
388
00:23:53,725 --> 00:23:56,019
Well, I remember the line from Howl...
389
00:23:56,103 --> 00:23:58,939
"I've seen the best minds
of my generation...
390
00:24:00,107 --> 00:24:03,193
starved, hysterical, naked" —
391
00:24:03,276 --> 00:24:05,403
[ Normal Voice ]
You can't even quote it right.
392
00:24:05,487 --> 00:24:08,532
- "Looking for an angry fix." Okay.
- Oh, that, you got that.
393
00:24:09,908 --> 00:24:12,828
Uh, Burroughs fell in love
with me and I —
394
00:24:12,911 --> 00:24:17,165
and we slept together
and I saw his very soft center...
395
00:24:17,249 --> 00:24:20,961
where he felt isolated
and alone in the world...
396
00:24:21,044 --> 00:24:26,925
and really needed a human,
humane, uh, gift in return.
397
00:24:27,008 --> 00:24:28,844
A feeling, you know, of affection.
398
00:24:28,927 --> 00:24:32,347
And since I did love him and did have
that respect and affection...
399
00:24:32,430 --> 00:24:34,474
I think he responded.
400
00:24:34,558 --> 00:24:37,227
So I kind of felt privileged
that I had —
401
00:24:37,310 --> 00:24:39,896
"J'ai seul la clef
de cette parade sauvage."
402
00:24:40,397 --> 00:24:43,692
I alone had the key
to this savage parade...
403
00:24:43,775 --> 00:24:47,529
which was the key
of, uh, tenderness.
404
00:24:48,155 --> 00:24:49,656
Willy —
405
00:24:50,782 --> 00:24:53,326
I've known Willy a long fucking time...
406
00:24:53,410 --> 00:24:55,162
about 40 years.
407
00:24:55,245 --> 00:24:57,831
I was just thinking
of, uh, Willy in the old days...
408
00:24:57,914 --> 00:25:01,668
when Willy was
a more robust figure...
409
00:25:01,751 --> 00:25:04,504
and used to speak
with a thunder in his chest...
410
00:25:04,588 --> 00:25:07,757
as he chased skirts
around Saint Louis.
411
00:25:07,841 --> 00:25:09,801
- Yes, yes.
- [ Laughing ]
412
00:25:09,885 --> 00:25:14,347
[ Chuckling ]
That was — That was many years ago.
413
00:25:14,848 --> 00:25:19,394
Like when we were
in the military school,
they called me "The Terror."
414
00:25:19,477 --> 00:25:23,398
- [ Laughing ]
- Yes, I remember.
415
00:25:23,481 --> 00:25:25,192
[ Laughing ]
416
00:25:25,275 --> 00:25:30,030
Yes, I used to be quite a —
quite a woman chaser.
417
00:25:30,113 --> 00:25:33,408
- You were.
- Willy the lover. I'm telling you, man.
418
00:25:33,491 --> 00:25:35,660
That was the line
that always got 'em.
419
00:25:35,744 --> 00:25:37,621
He tore open his shirt,
screaming...
420
00:25:37,704 --> 00:25:40,332
"There's a thunder in my breast!"
421
00:25:40,415 --> 00:25:43,015
- They all fell flat on their backs.
- That got 'em. That got 'em.
422
00:25:43,084 --> 00:25:45,629
Every time, every time.
423
00:25:45,712 --> 00:25:47,214
[ Carr ]
Yeah, Willy was pretty funny.
424
00:25:47,297 --> 00:25:50,550
Willy —
Actually, Willy's a very warm guy...
425
00:25:50,634 --> 00:25:53,678
- once you get through to Willy.
- [ Man ] Mm-hmm.
426
00:25:53,762 --> 00:25:56,264
You've surely heard him sing
his sentimental songs...
427
00:25:56,348 --> 00:25:58,433
like "Adiós, Muchachos."
428
00:25:59,351 --> 00:26:01,895
♪ Adiós, muchachas ♪
429
00:26:01,978 --> 00:26:04,397
♪ Compañeros ♪♪
430
00:26:04,481 --> 00:26:07,025
♪♪ [ Vocalizing ]
431
00:26:08,818 --> 00:26:12,781
His morals are probably Boy Scout
morals, true blue, you know?
432
00:26:12,864 --> 00:26:14,366
Yeah.
433
00:26:14,449 --> 00:26:16,868
And the last thing
he wants anyone to know is that.
434
00:26:18,203 --> 00:26:20,497
Tell me, Willy,
what have you been up to lately?
435
00:26:20,580 --> 00:26:26,670
Oh, well, I've been giving readings
in punk rock clubs.
436
00:26:26,753 --> 00:26:28,255
Twenty-one readings.
437
00:26:28,338 --> 00:26:30,757
- That's the proper side of your life.
- Yes.
438
00:26:30,840 --> 00:26:32,676
Now tell me about the other side.
439
00:26:32,759 --> 00:26:35,929
There isn't very much
other side, Lucien.
440
00:26:36,012 --> 00:26:39,641
Now, Willy, I know
you're doing disreputable things.
441
00:26:39,724 --> 00:26:42,102
- No.
- [ Gunshots In Distance ]
442
00:26:42,185 --> 00:26:44,938
Just going to my methadone clinic
can hardly be called disreputable.
443
00:26:45,021 --> 00:26:46,856
[ Laughing ]
444
00:26:47,565 --> 00:26:50,026
No, that's highly constructive,
I must say.
445
00:26:50,110 --> 00:26:51,611
[ Murmurs ]
446
00:26:52,362 --> 00:26:56,992
Sort of a buxom Irish maid,
as I remember,
said that she had heard...
447
00:26:57,075 --> 00:27:02,789
that opium gives people
pleasant, beautiful dreams.
448
00:27:02,872 --> 00:27:05,917
And since I was much plagued
by nightmares as a child...
449
00:27:06,001 --> 00:27:12,841
in fact it was, uh,
one of the real influences
in my childhood...
450
00:27:12,924 --> 00:27:15,552
the fear of nightmares.
451
00:27:15,635 --> 00:27:18,054
And, uh, so she said that opium —
452
00:27:18,138 --> 00:27:21,474
When she said
that opium gave you sweet dreams...
453
00:27:21,558 --> 00:27:24,769
I thought, "Well, that's for me.
I'm gonna get some of that."
454
00:27:26,896 --> 00:27:28,398
[ Burroughs ]
The boy looked up...
455
00:27:28,481 --> 00:27:31,818
into the sailor's dead,
cold, undersea eyes.
456
00:27:31,901 --> 00:27:33,486
The sailor leaned forward...
457
00:27:33,570 --> 00:27:36,072
and put a finger
on the boy's inner arm.
458
00:27:36,156 --> 00:27:40,076
He spoke in a dead, junkie whisper.
459
00:27:40,160 --> 00:27:45,915
"With veins like that, kid,
I'd have myself a time."
460
00:27:48,209 --> 00:27:50,378
Phil White, uh...
461
00:27:50,920 --> 00:27:54,174
- the character sailor
in The Naked Lunch —
- Right.
462
00:27:54,257 --> 00:27:57,802
uh, and myself...
463
00:27:59,220 --> 00:28:02,515
got him started, in
a manner of speaking, on morphine.
464
00:28:03,308 --> 00:28:05,393
Well, there was a knock on the door...
465
00:28:05,477 --> 00:28:10,690
and I opened it and there stood Bob...
466
00:28:10,774 --> 00:28:16,112
with this very
sedate looking gentleman...
467
00:28:16,196 --> 00:28:18,740
who turned out to be Bill Burroughs.
468
00:28:18,823 --> 00:28:22,786
He was wearing
a snap-brim fedora hat...
469
00:28:24,287 --> 00:28:26,498
gray gloves...
470
00:28:26,581 --> 00:28:30,251
one of which
he was carrying in his hand...
471
00:28:30,335 --> 00:28:32,837
and he was sort of standing there...
472
00:28:32,921 --> 00:28:35,882
looking down his nose
as only Bill can...
473
00:28:35,965 --> 00:28:39,386
you know, just sort of peering
into the room...
474
00:28:39,469 --> 00:28:42,597
taking everything in,
you know, the site.
475
00:28:42,680 --> 00:28:45,725
As soon as I could,
I called Bob in the other room...
476
00:28:45,809 --> 00:28:48,728
and I said, "Hey, man,
what is this dude out here?"
477
00:28:48,812 --> 00:28:52,565
I said, "Man, you brought heat here.
You'd better get him out."
478
00:28:52,649 --> 00:28:55,360
He says, "Oh, he's fine.
He's good people.
479
00:28:55,443 --> 00:28:58,822
Just don't worry about it.
He's a nice guy."
480
00:29:00,281 --> 00:29:02,521
[ Man ] Where'd you get money from
when you were scoring?
481
00:29:02,575 --> 00:29:04,285
[ Chuckling ]
482
00:29:04,369 --> 00:29:07,705
Uh, well, stealing.
483
00:29:08,540 --> 00:29:11,918
They were bringing in stuff
from stolen cars and —
484
00:29:12,001 --> 00:29:13,920
[ Chuckles ]
485
00:29:14,003 --> 00:29:19,050
Fritz, the old, uh,
elevator man, said...
486
00:29:19,134 --> 00:29:20,969
"Tell Mr. Huncke all right...
487
00:29:21,052 --> 00:29:23,346
bring the stuff
that you steal from cars...
488
00:29:23,430 --> 00:29:26,683
but do not leave the car
in front of the place."
489
00:29:27,350 --> 00:29:31,563
Huncke got —
stole a script — prescription pad...
490
00:29:31,646 --> 00:29:34,107
from an old doctor in Brooklyn...
491
00:29:34,190 --> 00:29:38,945
and Bill wrote up some phony scripts
signed by the doctor...
492
00:29:39,028 --> 00:29:41,865
which he cashed
right around Columbia.
493
00:29:41,948 --> 00:29:44,659
I got busted. Bill got busted.
494
00:29:44,742 --> 00:29:47,871
And then I think his family sent
up money to get him out...
495
00:29:47,954 --> 00:29:50,832
or his father came,
or maybe his brother came.
496
00:29:50,915 --> 00:29:52,917
We were all very upset
and very desolate...
497
00:29:53,001 --> 00:29:56,921
because this was the first ring of iron
I'd heard around the —
498
00:29:57,005 --> 00:29:59,299
in our small circle there.
499
00:29:59,382 --> 00:30:04,179
He's probably the only guy I know...
500
00:30:04,262 --> 00:30:08,266
who was really just full-out junkie...
501
00:30:08,349 --> 00:30:10,685
who managed to come back to —
502
00:30:12,270 --> 00:30:17,609
you know, and, uh, kick it and so on.
503
00:30:18,735 --> 00:30:20,195
Very rare.
504
00:30:20,278 --> 00:30:23,198
I started out to be a doctor.
505
00:30:23,281 --> 00:30:26,409
Studied for almost a year in Vienna.
506
00:30:26,493 --> 00:30:28,161
That-That was one —
507
00:30:28,244 --> 00:30:32,373
That would be one
of my alternative professions...
508
00:30:32,457 --> 00:30:34,542
if I hadn't have been a writer.
509
00:30:34,626 --> 00:30:39,172
The other career that I missed out on
was espionage.
510
00:30:39,255 --> 00:30:45,178
I was almost accepted
by, um, Colonel Bill Donovan...
511
00:30:45,261 --> 00:30:49,015
and then I ran into somebody
that really hates me...
512
00:30:49,098 --> 00:30:51,309
or hated me at that time...
513
00:30:51,392 --> 00:30:55,355
my housemaster at Harvard,
a guy named Baxter...
514
00:30:55,438 --> 00:30:57,941
and he put the skids to me.
515
00:30:59,108 --> 00:31:01,736
So, I might've been —
516
00:31:01,819 --> 00:31:05,448
might've been head of the CIA.
[ Clears Throat ]
517
00:31:08,451 --> 00:31:11,371
[ Burroughs ] Let me explain
how we make an arrest.
518
00:31:11,454 --> 00:31:14,791
Nova criminals are not
three-dimensional organisms...
519
00:31:14,874 --> 00:31:18,962
but they need three-dimensional
human agents to operate.
520
00:31:19,045 --> 00:31:21,965
Now a single controller can operate...
521
00:31:22,048 --> 00:31:24,592
through thousands of human agents...
522
00:31:24,676 --> 00:31:28,429
but he must have a line
of coordinate points.
523
00:31:28,513 --> 00:31:30,640
♪♪ [ Swing ]
524
00:31:32,559 --> 00:31:36,563
Some move on junk lines
through addicts of the earth.
525
00:31:36,646 --> 00:31:41,401
Others move on lines
of certain, uh, sexual practices.
526
00:31:42,652 --> 00:31:46,573
It is only when
we can block a controller
out of all coordinate points...
527
00:31:46,656 --> 00:31:50,118
and flush him out
that we can make an arrest.
528
00:31:52,829 --> 00:31:56,583
Fade out to a shabby hotel
near Earls Court in London.
529
00:31:56,666 --> 00:31:59,419
One of our agents
is posing as a writer.
530
00:31:59,502 --> 00:32:03,214
He has written
a so-called pornographic novel
called Naked Lunch...
531
00:32:03,298 --> 00:32:07,135
in which the orgasm death
gimmick is described.
532
00:32:07,218 --> 00:32:09,053
[ No Audible Dialogue ]
533
00:32:09,971 --> 00:32:15,143
That was the bait,
and they walked right in.
534
00:32:15,226 --> 00:32:17,979
"The lavatory had been locked
for three hours solid.
535
00:32:18,062 --> 00:32:20,440
I think they're using it
for an operating room.
536
00:32:20,523 --> 00:32:22,525
'Nurse!'"
537
00:32:22,609 --> 00:32:24,944
I can't find his pulse, Doctor.
538
00:32:25,028 --> 00:32:26,988
[ Burroughs Reading ]
"Doctor Benway."
539
00:32:29,532 --> 00:32:32,660
- Cardiac arrest, goddamn it!
- Adrenaline, Doctor?
540
00:32:32,744 --> 00:32:35,163
No, the night porter shot it
all up for kicks.
541
00:32:35,246 --> 00:32:37,665
"Picks up one of those vacuum cups...
542
00:32:37,749 --> 00:32:40,960
at the end of a stick
they use to unstop toilets.
543
00:32:41,044 --> 00:32:43,046
He advances on the patient."
544
00:32:43,129 --> 00:32:45,965
Make an incision, Doctor Limpf.
545
00:32:46,716 --> 00:32:48,509
I'm gonna massage the heart.
546
00:32:48,593 --> 00:32:51,721
[ Burroughs Reading ]
"Dr. Limpf shrugs
and begins the incision.
547
00:32:51,804 --> 00:32:54,307
Doctor Benway washes
the suction cup...
548
00:32:54,390 --> 00:32:56,976
by swishing it around the toilet bowl."
549
00:32:57,060 --> 00:32:59,145
Shouldn't that be sterilized,
Doctor?
550
00:32:59,228 --> 00:33:02,565
Very likely,
but there's no time.
551
00:33:02,649 --> 00:33:05,652
[ Burroughs Reading ]
"Watching his assistant make
the incision...
552
00:33:05,735 --> 00:33:08,988
he sits on the suction cup
like a cane seat."
553
00:33:09,072 --> 00:33:12,367
You young squirts
couldn't lance a pimple...
554
00:33:12,450 --> 00:33:15,495
without an electric vibrating scalpel...
555
00:33:15,578 --> 00:33:18,247
with automatic drain and suture.
556
00:33:18,915 --> 00:33:21,834
All the skill is going out of surgery...
557
00:33:21,918 --> 00:33:24,253
all the know-how and make-do.
558
00:33:25,088 --> 00:33:28,299
"'Did I ever tell you about the time
I performed an appendectomy...
559
00:33:28,383 --> 00:33:31,052
with a rusty sardine can?'"
560
00:33:32,220 --> 00:33:36,474
And once I was caught short
without instrument one...
561
00:33:36,557 --> 00:33:41,145
and removed an uterine tumor
with my teeth.
562
00:33:41,938 --> 00:33:45,358
Mmm.
That was in the Upper Effendi...
563
00:33:45,441 --> 00:33:49,904
and besides, the wench is dead.
564
00:33:49,987 --> 00:33:51,864
The incision is ready, Doctor.
565
00:33:51,948 --> 00:33:55,159
[ Burroughs Reading ]
"Dr. Benway forces the cup
into the incision...
566
00:33:55,243 --> 00:33:57,537
and works it up and down.
567
00:33:57,620 --> 00:34:02,375
Blood spurts all over the doctors,
the nurses and the wall...
568
00:34:02,458 --> 00:34:05,753
and the cup makes
a horrible sucking sound."
569
00:34:05,837 --> 00:34:07,714
I think he's gone, Doctor.
570
00:34:07,797 --> 00:34:10,049
Well, it's all in a day's work.
571
00:34:14,178 --> 00:34:17,432
[ Burroughs Reading ]
"He walks across the room
to a medicine cabinet."
572
00:34:22,895 --> 00:34:27,108
Some fucking drug addict has
cut my cocaine with Sani-Flush.
573
00:34:34,532 --> 00:34:39,912
"'Nurse, send the boy out
to fill this Rx on the double.'"
574
00:34:40,830 --> 00:34:44,834
- Thank you.
- [ Applauding, Cheering ]
575
00:34:50,173 --> 00:34:52,258
We thought
you went into exterminating.
576
00:34:52,341 --> 00:34:54,761
Weren't you doing that also
in Chicago? Yeah.
577
00:34:54,844 --> 00:34:56,721
Yep.
578
00:34:56,804 --> 00:34:59,182
I was known as the exterminator.
579
00:35:00,725 --> 00:35:02,226
[ Ginsberg ]
By whom?
580
00:35:03,352 --> 00:35:05,646
- Housewives.
- [ Ginsberg, Carr Chuckling ]
581
00:35:07,190 --> 00:35:09,692
Housewives and cockroaches.
582
00:35:10,193 --> 00:35:13,196
Exterminator.
You got any bugs, lady?
583
00:35:16,032 --> 00:35:18,618
- Oh, you're gonna leave?
- Have a good supper, Willy.
584
00:35:18,701 --> 00:35:20,661
Pass our regards around.
585
00:35:20,745 --> 00:35:22,246
With Herbert Huncke?
586
00:35:22,330 --> 00:35:24,874
- Good night.
- Good night, Willy.
587
00:35:24,957 --> 00:35:26,959
[ Ginsberg ]
Have a nice supper.
588
00:35:28,169 --> 00:35:30,880
[ Huncke ]
Bill had moved in with Joan Adams...
589
00:35:30,963 --> 00:35:36,969
in her apartment
up on 115th Street and —
590
00:35:37,053 --> 00:35:38,805
Right next to the university.
591
00:35:38,930 --> 00:35:42,475
[ Ginsberg ]
Jack and I decided that Joan
and Bill would make a great couple...
592
00:35:42,558 --> 00:35:46,145
that they were a match for each other,
fit for each other...
593
00:35:46,229 --> 00:35:48,815
equally attuned and equally witty
and equally intelligent...
594
00:35:48,898 --> 00:35:52,026
equally well read,
equally refined of mind.
595
00:35:52,109 --> 00:35:56,072
She was a very, very learned,
very bright...
596
00:35:56,155 --> 00:35:58,032
very beautiful woman.
597
00:35:59,408 --> 00:36:01,911
- [ Man ] So she and Bill —
- And she adored Bill.
598
00:36:01,994 --> 00:36:07,500
Well, we had all these very,
really, in retrospect...
599
00:36:07,583 --> 00:36:11,087
very deep conversations...
600
00:36:11,629 --> 00:36:13,589
about very fundamental things.
601
00:36:13,673 --> 00:36:17,343
I say,
her intuition was absolutely amazing.
602
00:36:17,426 --> 00:36:20,972
He would lie around
on the long couch talking.
603
00:36:21,055 --> 00:36:22,932
She sometimes
would lie down next to him...
604
00:36:23,015 --> 00:36:26,853
and put her arm
around his, uh, abdomen.
605
00:36:26,936 --> 00:36:29,522
[ Burroughs ]
One time she said...
606
00:36:29,605 --> 00:36:33,526
"Well, you're supposed
to be a faggot...
607
00:36:33,609 --> 00:36:36,070
but you're as good as a pimp in bed."
608
00:36:36,153 --> 00:36:38,114
[ Men Laugh ]
609
00:36:38,197 --> 00:36:39,907
Those were her very words.
610
00:36:40,575 --> 00:36:43,119
Well, I thought this was nonsense
and I still do.
611
00:36:43,786 --> 00:36:47,999
I was, uh, with Lucien
on a trip to Mexico...
612
00:36:48,082 --> 00:36:51,752
and we were with Joan
until about, uh...
613
00:36:51,836 --> 00:36:54,380
24 or 48 hours before she died.
614
00:36:54,463 --> 00:36:57,884
It had to be the longest
drunken driving trip...
615
00:36:57,967 --> 00:37:00,636
that I've ever taken in my life, which —
616
00:37:01,470 --> 00:37:04,348
Joan Burroughs and I were
at the wheel...
617
00:37:04,432 --> 00:37:05,975
and Allen, who didn't drive...
618
00:37:06,058 --> 00:37:10,646
and Billy Jr. and Julie were
the unwilling passengers.
619
00:37:11,355 --> 00:37:13,649
He was going around
these hairpin turns — turns...
620
00:37:13,733 --> 00:37:17,236
and she was urging him on,
saying, "How fast can this heap go?"
621
00:37:17,320 --> 00:37:19,488
While me and the kids were
cowering in the back.
622
00:37:19,572 --> 00:37:22,325
Joan and I were drinking
and driving so heavily...
623
00:37:22,408 --> 00:37:25,077
that at one point
we could only make the car go...
624
00:37:25,161 --> 00:37:28,414
if I lay on the floor
and pushed on the gas pedal...
625
00:37:29,165 --> 00:37:33,502
while she used her one good leg
to work the brake and the clutch.
626
00:37:34,629 --> 00:37:39,175
It was a pretty hairy trip, but Joan
and I thought it was great fun.
627
00:37:40,176 --> 00:37:43,179
Allen, I don't think, did,
and surely the kids didn't.
628
00:37:44,764 --> 00:37:49,018
"Dream record, June 8, 1955.
629
00:37:49,810 --> 00:37:53,814
A drunken night in my house
with a boy. San Francisco.
630
00:37:53,898 --> 00:37:56,567
I lay asleep. Darkness.
631
00:37:57,109 --> 00:37:58,736
I went back to Mexico City...
632
00:37:58,819 --> 00:38:02,657
and saw Joan Burroughs
leaning forward in a garden chair...
633
00:38:02,740 --> 00:38:04,784
arms on her knees.
634
00:38:04,867 --> 00:38:09,163
She studied me with clear eyes
and downcast smile.
635
00:38:09,664 --> 00:38:14,585
Her face restored to a fine beauty
tequila and salt had made strange...
636
00:38:14,669 --> 00:38:16,754
before the bullet in her brow.
637
00:38:17,838 --> 00:38:19,799
We talked of a life since then.
638
00:38:19,882 --> 00:38:22,301
'Well, what's Burroughs doing now?'
639
00:38:22,385 --> 00:38:25,096
'Still on earth. He's in North Africa.'
640
00:38:25,179 --> 00:38:26,639
'Oh? And Kerouac?'
641
00:38:26,722 --> 00:38:30,226
'Jack still jumps
with the same beat genius as before.
642
00:38:30,309 --> 00:38:31,894
Notebooks filled with Buddha.'
643
00:38:31,978 --> 00:38:34,230
'I hope he makes it,' she laughed.
644
00:38:34,313 --> 00:38:36,232
'Is Huncke still in the can?'
645
00:38:36,315 --> 00:38:38,818
'No, last time I saw him
on Times Square.'
646
00:38:38,901 --> 00:38:40,403
'And how is Lucien?'
647
00:38:40,486 --> 00:38:42,863
'Married, drunk and golden
in the East.'
648
00:38:42,947 --> 00:38:45,825
'You?'
'New love is in the West.'
649
00:38:45,908 --> 00:38:49,912
Then I knew she was a dream
and questioned her.
650
00:38:49,996 --> 00:38:53,666
'Joan, what kind of knowledge
have the dead?'"
651
00:38:56,335 --> 00:38:59,380
Joan was, uh, not making it with Bill...
652
00:38:59,463 --> 00:39:01,757
and was a little irritated with him.
653
00:39:02,258 --> 00:39:06,429
Bill had been off
with a young friend.
654
00:39:06,929 --> 00:39:10,975
Um, I had talked to her
the day before.
655
00:39:11,058 --> 00:39:13,519
Julie, her daughter,
was actually quite cute...
656
00:39:13,602 --> 00:39:15,396
and was flirtatious.
657
00:39:15,479 --> 00:39:18,691
And I said, "She's gonna
give you some competition."
658
00:39:19,358 --> 00:39:21,694
And Joan said,
"Oh, I'm out of the competition."
659
00:39:21,777 --> 00:39:23,571
So she'd sort of given up
on love life.
660
00:39:23,654 --> 00:39:26,365
[ Burroughs ]
We were down in Mexico...
661
00:39:26,449 --> 00:39:30,369
when she began, uh,
drinking quite heavily.
662
00:39:30,453 --> 00:39:34,040
She'd put away a quart
of tequila a day.
663
00:39:34,123 --> 00:39:37,501
Just sort of slugging it down
all day, you know?
664
00:39:37,585 --> 00:39:41,714
Never showed the least sign
of, uh, being drunk.
665
00:39:41,797 --> 00:39:43,632
My impression, when we left...
666
00:39:43,716 --> 00:39:46,761
was that there was something
scary about her, suicidal.
667
00:39:46,844 --> 00:39:50,014
That day I knew something awful
was going to happen.
668
00:39:50,097 --> 00:39:51,777
I remember
I was walking down the street...
669
00:39:51,807 --> 00:39:54,727
and tears started
just streaming down my face.
670
00:39:54,810 --> 00:39:57,605
Well, if that happens to you,
watch out, baby.
671
00:39:57,688 --> 00:40:02,443
You see, I've always felt myself
to be controlled at some times...
672
00:40:02,526 --> 00:40:05,237
by this completely malevolent force...
673
00:40:05,321 --> 00:40:08,616
which Brion described
as the "ugly spirit."
674
00:40:09,241 --> 00:40:12,912
But my walking down the street...
675
00:40:12,995 --> 00:40:15,164
and tears streaming down my face...
676
00:40:15,247 --> 00:40:18,751
meant that I knew
that the ugly spirit...
677
00:40:18,834 --> 00:40:22,421
which is always the worst part
of everyone's character...
678
00:40:22,505 --> 00:40:26,008
would take over and that
something awful would happen.
679
00:40:27,093 --> 00:40:30,429
I took a knife
that I had bought in Ecuador...
680
00:40:30,513 --> 00:40:34,642
uh, and left it with a knife sharpener
to be sharpened.
681
00:40:35,434 --> 00:40:39,772
I went back to the apartment...
682
00:40:39,855 --> 00:40:41,941
where we were all meeting...
683
00:40:42,024 --> 00:40:46,112
and with this terrible sense
of depression.
684
00:40:46,195 --> 00:40:49,907
And foolishly, of course,
in order to alleviate the depression...
685
00:40:49,990 --> 00:40:52,827
I started tossing down the drinks.
686
00:40:52,910 --> 00:40:56,205
Then I said to Joan, "It's about time
for our William Tell act."
687
00:40:57,331 --> 00:40:59,792
And she put a glass on her head...
688
00:40:59,875 --> 00:41:05,881
and I had this piece
of, uh,.380 junk.
689
00:41:05,965 --> 00:41:09,635
Just as she had said to Lucien,
"How fast can this heap go?"...
690
00:41:10,219 --> 00:41:13,305
I think she said to Bill,
"Well, shoot that off my head."
691
00:41:13,389 --> 00:41:15,474
I fired the shot.
692
00:41:15,558 --> 00:41:18,435
The glass hadn't been touched.
693
00:41:18,519 --> 00:41:22,481
Joan started sliding down
towards the floor.
694
00:41:22,565 --> 00:41:25,067
Then Marcus said —
695
00:41:25,151 --> 00:41:28,571
walked over
and took one look at her.
696
00:41:28,654 --> 00:41:32,074
He said, "Bill, your bullet has hit
her forehead."
697
00:41:34,660 --> 00:41:36,162
I said, "Oh, my God."
698
00:41:36,245 --> 00:41:41,041
I always thought that
she had kind of challenged him
into it and led him into it...
699
00:41:41,125 --> 00:41:44,044
that it was sort of
like using him to —
700
00:41:44,128 --> 00:41:46,922
that she was, in a sense,
using him to...
701
00:41:48,340 --> 00:41:51,552
get her off the earth, 'cause I think
she was in a great deal of pain.
702
00:41:51,635 --> 00:41:54,096
[ Burroughs ] The ambulance came.
The police came.
703
00:41:54,763 --> 00:41:59,101
I went down
to police headquarters with them.
704
00:41:59,185 --> 00:42:02,730
I hadn't been there five minutes
when my lawyer walks in.
705
00:42:02,813 --> 00:42:06,192
He said, "Don't say anything, Bill.
Don't say anything.
706
00:42:06,275 --> 00:42:09,361
Um, this is a shooting accident."
707
00:42:09,445 --> 00:42:11,780
[ Man ] Had you done
the William Tell thing before?
708
00:42:11,864 --> 00:42:13,574
Never.
709
00:42:13,657 --> 00:42:16,035
Never. Never.
710
00:42:16,118 --> 00:42:19,038
Just an absolute piece of insanity.
711
00:42:20,873 --> 00:42:24,752
♪♪ [ Jazz ]
712
00:42:24,835 --> 00:42:29,423
[ Woman ]
♪ I hate to see ♪
713
00:42:29,506 --> 00:42:33,802
♪ The evening sun go down ♪
714
00:42:41,143 --> 00:42:44,897
♪ I hate to see ♪
715
00:42:44,980 --> 00:42:49,902
♪ The evening sun go down ♪
716
00:42:55,449 --> 00:42:59,536
♪ It makes me think I'm ♪
717
00:43:00,287 --> 00:43:05,501
♪ On my last go-round ♪♪
718
00:43:09,255 --> 00:43:11,340
♪♪ [ Ends ]
719
00:43:12,216 --> 00:43:14,218
Years later, I think it was, Bill —
720
00:43:14,301 --> 00:43:15,928
I've heard a few different things
from Bill.
721
00:43:16,011 --> 00:43:18,389
He says that he wept a great deal.
722
00:43:18,472 --> 00:43:22,434
He also said that, uh...
723
00:43:22,518 --> 00:43:26,105
one time, many years ago,
he was puzzled...
724
00:43:26,188 --> 00:43:30,526
by what got into him
that he would actually pick up on it.
725
00:43:30,609 --> 00:43:36,824
My whole life has been a resistance
to the ugly spirit.
726
00:43:36,907 --> 00:43:38,409
[ Clears Throat ]
727
00:43:39,660 --> 00:43:41,120
Oh, absolutely.
728
00:43:41,203 --> 00:43:45,207
I've felt it,
lived with it day and night.
729
00:43:46,417 --> 00:43:50,296
[ Ginsberg ] Well, it gave Bill,
certainly, a taste of mortality.
730
00:43:50,379 --> 00:43:51,964
It opened him up quite a bit.
731
00:43:52,047 --> 00:43:54,216
It was then that he began writing.
732
00:43:55,134 --> 00:43:57,803
It was then that Bill got very serious...
733
00:43:57,886 --> 00:44:00,514
and began casting about
for something to do...
734
00:44:00,597 --> 00:44:05,394
to connect to himself,
to the reality around him.
735
00:44:05,477 --> 00:44:07,771
Uh, I think it grounded him a bit...
736
00:44:07,855 --> 00:44:09,815
'cause it's from then on,
as I remember...
737
00:44:09,898 --> 00:44:11,483
that he begins writing Junkie.
738
00:44:11,567 --> 00:44:15,154
[ Man ] Growing up, you know,
my grandparents raised me...
739
00:44:15,237 --> 00:44:17,865
because after that tragic accident,
you know...
740
00:44:17,948 --> 00:44:20,576
when I was much younger,
with my mother and everything...
741
00:44:20,659 --> 00:44:23,495
Bill went and started traveling
around the world and stuff...
742
00:44:24,413 --> 00:44:27,666
but we kept in
sort of psychic communication...
743
00:44:27,750 --> 00:44:30,753
one way or another,
most of my life.
744
00:44:30,836 --> 00:44:32,338
Just as I reached puberty...
745
00:44:32,421 --> 00:44:35,382
he started sending me copies
of Rimbaud to read...
746
00:44:35,466 --> 00:44:37,259
and stuff like that.
747
00:44:37,343 --> 00:44:39,345
Every so often, um...
748
00:44:39,428 --> 00:44:42,181
things like a plaster cast of
a shrunken head from the Amazon...
749
00:44:42,264 --> 00:44:45,392
would appear in the mail
and things like that.
750
00:44:45,476 --> 00:44:50,147
Beautiful Amazonian butterflies
in little glass cases...
751
00:44:50,230 --> 00:44:51,899
and-and things like that.
752
00:44:51,982 --> 00:44:56,028
You know, I'd keep in touch
with physical objects
that he would send me.
753
00:44:56,820 --> 00:45:01,492
I started to write
in Mexico in 1948...
754
00:45:01,575 --> 00:45:05,704
and that's where my first novel,
Junkie, was written...
755
00:45:05,788 --> 00:45:09,249
and published in 1953...
756
00:45:09,333 --> 00:45:14,088
owing to the good offices
of Allen Ginsberg and Carl Solomon.
757
00:45:14,171 --> 00:45:16,173
[ Ginsberg ]
I remember when I took...
758
00:45:16,256 --> 00:45:18,926
the first manuscript of Junkie
to one of the publishers.
759
00:45:19,009 --> 00:45:21,220
He said, "Well, if this were written
by Winston Churchill...
760
00:45:21,303 --> 00:45:22,763
it would be interesting...
761
00:45:22,846 --> 00:45:25,849
but as it is not written
by anybody in particular...
762
00:45:25,933 --> 00:45:28,894
it isn't such good prose,
forget it."
763
00:45:28,977 --> 00:45:30,938
[ Burroughs ]
This is from Junkie.
764
00:45:31,021 --> 00:45:33,649
"I've just arrived
at this tenement apartment.
765
00:45:34,274 --> 00:45:35,734
After Joey went out...
766
00:45:35,818 --> 00:45:39,071
I noticed another man
who was standing there looking at me.
767
00:45:39,154 --> 00:45:41,365
Waves of hostility and suspicion...
768
00:45:41,448 --> 00:45:43,992
flowed out from his huge brown eyes...
769
00:45:44,076 --> 00:45:46,954
like some sort of television broadcast.
770
00:45:47,037 --> 00:45:51,166
The effect was
almost like a physical impact.
771
00:45:51,250 --> 00:45:53,585
The man was small and very thin...
772
00:45:53,669 --> 00:45:57,256
his neck loose in the collar of his shirt.
773
00:45:57,339 --> 00:46:01,468
His complexion faded from brown
to a mottled yellow...
774
00:46:01,552 --> 00:46:04,763
and pancake makeup
had been heavily applied...
775
00:46:04,847 --> 00:46:09,017
in an attempt
to conceal a skin eruption."
776
00:46:10,644 --> 00:46:14,606
And what was my reaction to Bill...
777
00:46:14,690 --> 00:46:19,111
and Bill's comments
about me in Junkie?
778
00:46:19,194 --> 00:46:23,866
I rather resented
having a scrawny neck. [ Laughs ]
779
00:46:23,949 --> 00:46:27,911
But other than that, I — I —
780
00:46:27,995 --> 00:46:32,291
you know, I was pleased
that he'd even considered me...
781
00:46:32,374 --> 00:46:36,462
worth commenting about,
in a matter of speaking.
782
00:46:36,545 --> 00:46:39,047
It doesn't say "scrawny neck"
in here at all.
783
00:46:39,131 --> 00:46:43,093
I simply said that his neck was loose
in the collar of his shirt...
784
00:46:43,177 --> 00:46:46,221
which isn't at all the same thing.
785
00:46:46,305 --> 00:46:48,140
I don't find that a bit offensive.
786
00:46:48,223 --> 00:46:50,309
Look at this cover.
787
00:46:50,392 --> 00:46:52,561
[ Laughs ]
788
00:47:09,536 --> 00:47:13,540
[ No Audible Dialogue ]
789
00:47:40,025 --> 00:47:42,361
[ Man ]
In January of 1953...
790
00:47:42,444 --> 00:47:44,613
in the days that
I remember him first in Tangier...
791
00:47:44,696 --> 00:47:47,533
he was full of
the most extraordinary energy.
792
00:47:47,616 --> 00:47:49,409
He could punch a typewriter...
793
00:47:49,493 --> 00:47:51,620
or he could punch
a tape recorder to death...
794
00:47:51,703 --> 00:47:54,039
in shorter time
than any man I've ever known.
795
00:47:54,122 --> 00:47:56,208
He had such enormous energy
in those days...
796
00:47:56,291 --> 00:47:59,711
and such enormous intention
behind what he was doing.
797
00:47:59,795 --> 00:48:03,048
He lived in a very comfortable hotel...
798
00:48:03,131 --> 00:48:06,760
where he practiced pistol shooting
and typewriting...
799
00:48:06,843 --> 00:48:09,346
and was extraordinarily amusing.
800
00:48:09,429 --> 00:48:13,934
The stories that he told,
and his wit, and his invention...
801
00:48:14,476 --> 00:48:17,396
which he was just turning
into literature at that time...
802
00:48:17,479 --> 00:48:20,649
because, as he said himself,
he began to write very late in life.
803
00:48:24,319 --> 00:48:26,863
And during the years in Tangier...
804
00:48:26,947 --> 00:48:31,410
he had written a very, very great deal
in a rather short time.
805
00:48:31,493 --> 00:48:34,538
[ Clears Throat ]
I wrote very intensively...
806
00:48:34,621 --> 00:48:39,501
for about two years...
807
00:48:39,585 --> 00:48:46,008
and this material,
most of this material, um...
808
00:48:46,091 --> 00:48:48,552
went into Naked Lunch.
809
00:48:48,635 --> 00:48:54,141
That is, Naked Lunch was extracted
from this material...
810
00:48:54,224 --> 00:48:58,562
and also all the notes
that I had written...
811
00:48:58,645 --> 00:49:02,024
while addicted
over a period of eight years.
812
00:49:02,107 --> 00:49:04,901
[ Gysin ]
He spent a great deal of his time...
813
00:49:04,985 --> 00:49:08,155
dashing through the streets madly
from one pharmacy to another...
814
00:49:08,238 --> 00:49:12,034
getting chemicals that he could use
and boil down and inject.
815
00:49:12,117 --> 00:49:14,286
But gradually he began to become...
816
00:49:14,369 --> 00:49:16,455
more and more
invisible in the streets...
817
00:49:16,538 --> 00:49:18,624
as the winter wore on...
818
00:49:18,707 --> 00:49:22,002
and all the Spanish kids
called him the "hombre invisible."
819
00:49:22,085 --> 00:49:26,423
He went to the cafés that those boys
went to and saw a lot of them...
820
00:49:26,506 --> 00:49:28,842
and then became great friends
with Kiki...
821
00:49:28,925 --> 00:49:31,595
who would become
one of the characters of his writings...
822
00:49:31,678 --> 00:49:33,555
throughout the years, in fact.
823
00:49:33,639 --> 00:49:37,476
For about eight years, in Tangiers...
824
00:49:37,559 --> 00:49:40,646
I was writing sporadically...
825
00:49:40,729 --> 00:49:46,026
and a lot of this material was
in the letters to Allen Ginsberg...
826
00:49:46,109 --> 00:49:48,487
which have recently been published.
827
00:49:48,570 --> 00:49:51,448
I was surprised,
reading back over that...
828
00:49:51,531 --> 00:49:55,202
how much of Naked Lunch
is in those letters.
829
00:49:55,285 --> 00:50:00,374
"Dear Allen, Kiki comes on more
affectionate all the time.
830
00:50:00,457 --> 00:50:02,167
A real sweet kid.
831
00:50:02,250 --> 00:50:04,795
He is helping me get my clothes off.
832
00:50:04,878 --> 00:50:10,342
I can just barely make it
around the room, my ankle hurts so.
833
00:50:10,425 --> 00:50:13,178
I must see a doctor tomorrow.
834
00:50:13,261 --> 00:50:16,848
What a bum kick
to die in this awful place.
835
00:50:17,683 --> 00:50:24,106
This German cat practices something
he calls 'technological medicine.'
836
00:50:24,189 --> 00:50:28,485
'You can get by with one kidney.
Why have two?
837
00:50:28,568 --> 00:50:30,862
Yes, that is a kidney.
838
00:50:30,946 --> 00:50:35,117
The inside parts should not be
so close in together crowded.
839
00:50:35,200 --> 00:50:38,453
They need lebensraum
like their Vaterland.'"
840
00:50:39,705 --> 00:50:41,498
"The people ask...
841
00:50:41,581 --> 00:50:45,252
what would lead me
to write a book like Naked Lunch?
842
00:50:45,335 --> 00:50:48,213
Well, 'leads' is a good word.
843
00:50:48,296 --> 00:50:54,052
Yes, one is slowly led along
to write a book...
844
00:50:54,136 --> 00:50:58,557
and this looked good,
no trouble with the cast at all...
845
00:50:58,640 --> 00:51:04,563
and that's half the battle,
when you can find your characters.
846
00:51:04,646 --> 00:51:07,023
The more far-out sex pieces...
847
00:51:07,107 --> 00:51:10,110
I was just writing
for my own amusement.
848
00:51:10,193 --> 00:51:13,739
I would put them away
in an attic trunk...
849
00:51:13,822 --> 00:51:18,410
and leave them
for a distant boy to find.
850
00:51:18,493 --> 00:51:21,246
'Why, Ma, this stuff is terrific!
851
00:51:21,329 --> 00:51:25,417
And I thought he was just
an old book-of-the-month cornball.'"
852
00:51:30,297 --> 00:51:33,216
[ Man ] William Burroughs,
when you were in London...
853
00:51:33,300 --> 00:51:36,344
you'd already broken onto the scene,
of course, with Naked Lunch —
854
00:51:36,428 --> 00:51:39,723
Nova Express
was out in '64, wasn't it?
855
00:51:39,806 --> 00:51:41,975
But what were you writing then?
856
00:51:42,058 --> 00:51:46,438
[ Burroughs ]
Well, let's see. I wrote The Job
when I was in Duke Street.
857
00:51:46,521 --> 00:51:53,111
I also wrote Wild Boys,
partly there and partly in Marrakech.
858
00:51:53,195 --> 00:51:55,781
- That's absolutely your table, isn't it?
- Yes, it is.
859
00:51:55,864 --> 00:51:59,284
- The one thing that was part of the —
- Mm-hmm.
860
00:51:59,367 --> 00:52:01,703
- Part of the — Part of the work.
- Yes, right here.
861
00:52:01,787 --> 00:52:06,291
I also wrote, um, Exterminator!...
862
00:52:06,374 --> 00:52:08,877
and Port of Saints...
863
00:52:08,960 --> 00:52:11,160
- and The Last Words
of Dutch Schultz.
- [ Man ] Oh, yes.
864
00:52:11,213 --> 00:52:14,800
- So I was quite, uh — quite prolific.
- Pretty prolific.
865
00:52:18,261 --> 00:52:20,847
[ Gysin ] I think he was here
in London, as a matter of fact...
866
00:52:20,931 --> 00:52:22,849
when I came across the, uh...
867
00:52:22,933 --> 00:52:26,186
to me, happy accident of the cut-ups.
868
00:52:26,269 --> 00:52:28,897
[ Burroughs ] There are many ways
in which cut-ups can be done.
869
00:52:28,980 --> 00:52:32,067
One very simple way
that I've used frequently...
870
00:52:32,150 --> 00:52:36,488
is just take a page, cut it down
the middle and across the page...
871
00:52:36,571 --> 00:52:38,490
so you now have four sections...
872
00:52:38,573 --> 00:52:42,661
and you rearrange the sections
in a different order.
873
00:52:42,744 --> 00:52:47,999
And when this happens, of course,
you get new word combos.
874
00:52:48,083 --> 00:52:52,587
You also get new words created
by the cut-up.
875
00:52:59,886 --> 00:53:04,182
[ Gysin ] It occurred because I had
a number of sheets of newspaper...
876
00:53:04,266 --> 00:53:07,519
some British newspapers,
an American newspaper
published in Paris...
877
00:53:07,602 --> 00:53:11,565
and some other things that
happened to be lying on my desk...
878
00:53:11,648 --> 00:53:15,443
when I took a Stanley blade
and cut through them.
879
00:53:15,527 --> 00:53:19,781
And these little bits and pieces
looked so amusing to me...
880
00:53:19,865 --> 00:53:23,702
that I started jiggling them around
as one would in a collage.
881
00:53:23,785 --> 00:53:27,539
This was simply, of course,
applying the montage method...
882
00:53:27,622 --> 00:53:32,836
which was really rather old-hat
in painting at that time, to writing.
883
00:53:32,919 --> 00:53:36,214
As Brion said,
writing is 50 years behind painting.
884
00:53:38,049 --> 00:53:40,677
[ Burroughs's Voice ]
"Listen to my last words anywhere.
885
00:53:40,760 --> 00:53:43,555
Listen all you boards, governments...
886
00:53:43,638 --> 00:53:46,516
syndicates, nations of the world.
887
00:53:46,600 --> 00:53:50,645
And you powers behind
what filth deals...
888
00:53:50,729 --> 00:53:53,732
consummated in what lavatory...
889
00:53:53,815 --> 00:53:56,318
to take what is not yours...
890
00:53:56,401 --> 00:53:59,321
to sell out your sons forever...
891
00:53:59,863 --> 00:54:04,242
to sell the ground
from unborn feet forever.
892
00:54:09,122 --> 00:54:13,418
I bear no sick words, junk words...
893
00:54:13,501 --> 00:54:18,381
love words, forgive words from Jesus.
894
00:54:19,299 --> 00:54:24,471
I have not come to explain or tidy up.
895
00:54:24,554 --> 00:54:28,433
What am I doing over here
with the workers, with gooks...
896
00:54:28,516 --> 00:54:34,105
the apes, the dogs, the errand boys,
the human animals?
897
00:54:35,148 --> 00:54:40,362
Why don't I come over with the board
and drink Coca-Cola or make it?
898
00:54:41,029 --> 00:54:44,783
Explain how
the blood and bones and brains...
899
00:54:44,866 --> 00:54:47,494
of 100 million, more or less, gooks...
900
00:54:47,577 --> 00:54:50,997
went down the drain in green piss...
901
00:54:51,081 --> 00:54:56,044
so you on the board could use
bodies and minds and souls...
902
00:54:56,127 --> 00:55:03,301
that were not yours, are not yours,
and never will be yours.
903
00:55:03,385 --> 00:55:07,222
You have the wrong name
and the wrong number...
904
00:55:08,098 --> 00:55:11,476
Mr. Luce Getty Lee Rockefeller.
905
00:55:11,559 --> 00:55:13,603
Don't let them see us.
906
00:55:13,687 --> 00:55:16,648
Don't tell them what we are doing.
907
00:55:16,731 --> 00:55:20,986
Not the cancer deal with
the Venusians, not the green deal.
908
00:55:21,069 --> 00:55:22,988
Don't let that out.
909
00:55:23,071 --> 00:55:26,324
Disaster. Unimaginable disaster.
910
00:55:26,408 --> 00:55:30,203
Crab men, tapeworms...
911
00:55:30,286 --> 00:55:33,081
intestinal parasites.
912
00:55:34,457 --> 00:55:38,753
Like Burroughs,
that proud American name.
913
00:55:39,921 --> 00:55:43,550
Proud of what exactly?
914
00:55:43,633 --> 00:55:49,597
Would you all like to see exactly
what Burroughs has to be proud of?
915
00:55:50,223 --> 00:55:53,435
The Mayan caper,
the centipede hype...
916
00:55:53,518 --> 00:55:57,856
the short-time racket,
the heavy-metal gimmick.
917
00:55:57,939 --> 00:56:01,234
All right, Mr. Burroughs,
who bears my name...
918
00:56:01,317 --> 00:56:06,364
and my words bear it all the way
for all to see...
919
00:56:06,448 --> 00:56:09,576
in Times Square, in Piccadilly.
920
00:56:11,453 --> 00:56:15,290
Play it all, play it all, play it all back.
921
00:56:15,373 --> 00:56:19,669
Pay it all, pay it all, pay it all back.
922
00:56:21,463 --> 00:56:23,882
No, no, no.
923
00:56:23,965 --> 00:56:27,719
Premature, premature, premature.
924
00:56:27,802 --> 00:56:32,182
Are these the words
of the all-powerful boards...
925
00:56:32,265 --> 00:56:34,350
and syndicates of the earth?
926
00:56:34,434 --> 00:56:38,730
I say to all:
These words are not premature.
927
00:56:38,813 --> 00:56:42,567
These words may be too late."
928
00:56:43,568 --> 00:56:49,449
Every particle of this universe
contains the whole of the universe.
929
00:56:49,532 --> 00:56:52,368
You in yourself have the whole
of the universe.
930
00:56:52,452 --> 00:56:56,873
I cut you up in a certain way,
I cut up the universe.
931
00:56:56,956 --> 00:56:58,083
Mm-hmm.
932
00:56:58,166 --> 00:57:02,754
But all of Burroughs seems to be,
to me, to be coherent...
933
00:57:02,837 --> 00:57:04,464
once you know his method.
934
00:57:04,547 --> 00:57:09,302
Uh, you know,
what Lucien calls charlatanism...
935
00:57:09,385 --> 00:57:11,554
is actually experimental writing.
936
00:57:11,638 --> 00:57:14,140
You can otherwise call
Cézanne a charlatan...
937
00:57:14,224 --> 00:57:19,187
for trying to work with hot plains
advancing and cool plains receding...
938
00:57:19,270 --> 00:57:21,231
in the optical field of the eyeball.
939
00:57:21,314 --> 00:57:24,067
So Burroughs, in cutting up...
940
00:57:24,150 --> 00:57:27,112
was creating gaps in space,
gaps in time also...
941
00:57:27,195 --> 00:57:29,322
as Cézanne,
or as meditation does.
942
00:57:29,405 --> 00:57:33,868
If, uh— This is Wittgenstein.
943
00:57:33,952 --> 00:57:36,162
If you have a prerecorded universe...
944
00:57:36,246 --> 00:57:39,499
in which everything
is already prerecorded...
945
00:57:39,582 --> 00:57:43,002
the only thing
that is not prerecorded...
946
00:57:43,086 --> 00:57:46,381
are the pre-recordings themselves.
947
00:57:46,464 --> 00:57:51,553
So with my cut-ups, I was
attempting to tamper with...
948
00:57:51,636 --> 00:57:53,847
the basic pre-recordings.
949
00:57:53,930 --> 00:57:58,101
And I think I have succeeded
to some modest extent.
950
00:58:00,979 --> 00:58:04,858
Well, I first met William in his works.
951
00:58:04,941 --> 00:58:06,818
I was 14. I was a boy in Kansas...
952
00:58:06,901 --> 00:58:08,778
living in a small town...
953
00:58:08,862 --> 00:58:12,490
and I thought I was the only person
in the world who had ever...
954
00:58:12,574 --> 00:58:15,535
thought about sex with other boys...
955
00:58:15,618 --> 00:58:17,912
or sex with alien boys,
for that matter...
956
00:58:17,996 --> 00:58:22,709
or drugs,
or mental explorations of this kind.
957
00:58:22,792 --> 00:58:25,670
And then I found this book.
958
00:58:25,753 --> 00:58:28,673
There were these twins
in my childhood...
959
00:58:28,756 --> 00:58:30,425
and one of them —
I don't remember which one —
960
00:58:30,508 --> 00:58:33,094
gave me the book Naked Lunch.
961
00:58:33,178 --> 00:58:37,682
I was 14 and I read it, and, um,
it changed my life.
962
00:58:37,765 --> 00:58:40,351
James came first to see me...
963
00:58:40,435 --> 00:58:42,353
having read Bill,
and having read my work...
964
00:58:42,437 --> 00:58:44,355
and I was sort of available
and right there.
965
00:58:44,439 --> 00:58:46,399
Bill had just come back to America.
966
00:58:46,482 --> 00:58:51,237
So James had come to offer
his services to me as a secretary...
967
00:58:51,321 --> 00:58:53,198
and I was sort of hoping lover...
968
00:58:53,281 --> 00:58:56,618
'cause he was kind of cute
and he was 21 and funny.
969
00:58:56,701 --> 00:58:59,913
But Bill had just come back, and I
was worried about Bill getting straight.
970
00:59:00,038 --> 00:59:03,291
I said, "You want to be my secretary?
First thing to do is go down
and see Burroughs."
971
00:59:03,374 --> 00:59:05,335
So I called William.
972
00:59:05,418 --> 00:59:09,881
And he says, "Yeah, I'm at
452 Broadway, the subway."
973
00:59:09,964 --> 00:59:12,383
You know what I mean?
And on about the third or fourth visit...
974
00:59:12,467 --> 00:59:14,052
I said, "I need a place to stay."
975
00:59:14,135 --> 00:59:15,970
And he said,
"Why don't you move in here?"
976
00:59:16,054 --> 00:59:18,306
They had some sort of
love affair also...
977
00:59:18,389 --> 00:59:21,559
'cause James was quite open
and dug Bill.
978
00:59:21,643 --> 00:59:23,443
[ Grauerholz ]
It was, uh— It was interesting.
979
00:59:23,519 --> 00:59:25,605
It was really kind of my first —
980
00:59:25,688 --> 00:59:28,608
There had been other things, but
it was my first experience with a man.
981
00:59:28,691 --> 00:59:30,777
William is sort of, um —
982
00:59:30,860 --> 00:59:33,571
I don't know how long he has been.
Maybe always.
983
00:59:33,655 --> 00:59:37,742
He's sort of — I wanna say
spaced-out and kind of magical...
984
00:59:37,825 --> 00:59:40,662
at the same time about mail
and communications that come in...
985
00:59:40,745 --> 00:59:42,664
which is my specialty,
communications...
986
00:59:42,747 --> 00:59:44,249
and the forms of communication.
987
00:59:44,332 --> 00:59:49,212
So, I took over more and more
until finally I was handling everything...
988
00:59:49,295 --> 00:59:52,382
except the fact that
he lived from day to day...
989
00:59:52,465 --> 00:59:53,925
and the fact that he created.
990
00:59:54,008 --> 00:59:58,388
So I realized
that it was like a manager.
991
00:59:58,471 --> 01:00:02,642
And I know, it is true, that he feels
that I make the right decisions.
992
01:00:03,393 --> 01:00:04,936
Shall I sign it William?
993
01:00:05,019 --> 01:00:06,604
Mmm, yeah, you know Burt.
994
01:00:06,688 --> 01:00:08,856
Sure do. Huh?
995
01:00:08,940 --> 01:00:12,443
- How would you sign it for Burt?
- Well —
996
01:00:12,527 --> 01:00:14,028
Well, that's fine.
997
01:00:14,112 --> 01:00:16,239
Now this I haven't even looked at.
998
01:00:16,322 --> 01:00:19,158
A family picture.
Oh, my God. Look at this old photo.
999
01:00:19,242 --> 01:00:21,953
[ Grauerholz ] Well, I think —
maybe I touched on this before...
1000
01:00:22,036 --> 01:00:26,708
but since his son died —
since Billy died this year—
1001
01:00:26,791 --> 01:00:29,877
I've always felt — See,
I always felt funny dealing with Billy.
1002
01:00:29,961 --> 01:00:34,382
I loved Billy and, uh,
felt like a brother to him.
1003
01:00:34,465 --> 01:00:36,301
But you know how it is
between brothers.
1004
01:00:36,384 --> 01:00:37,844
There's a little rivalry.
1005
01:00:37,927 --> 01:00:40,847
Especially if one brother is a fuckup...
1006
01:00:40,930 --> 01:00:44,684
and the other is
an extraordinarily competent...
1007
01:00:44,767 --> 01:00:46,936
accomplishing person...
1008
01:00:47,020 --> 01:00:49,397
which is the one that I was, of course.
1009
01:00:49,480 --> 01:00:52,191
But I felt like he looked at me
as a reproach...
1010
01:00:52,275 --> 01:00:56,654
a living reproach, that I was the son
that William wanted, and not he.
1011
01:00:58,614 --> 01:01:00,408
Of course when they got together,
father and son...
1012
01:01:00,491 --> 01:01:03,745
as all fathers and sons,
there was a great deal of contention...
1013
01:01:03,828 --> 01:01:05,997
as there was
between me and my father...
1014
01:01:06,080 --> 01:01:08,166
as there was also
a great deal of empathy.
1015
01:01:08,249 --> 01:01:11,169
I would say that Willy had
a good deal of empathy with Bill...
1016
01:01:11,252 --> 01:01:13,671
and dug him,
admired him a great deal.
1017
01:01:13,755 --> 01:01:16,549
Actually loved him a great deal,
I would say.
1018
01:01:16,632 --> 01:01:21,262
But Willy was also very difficult
to be with...
1019
01:01:21,346 --> 01:01:25,558
and, you know, burned down a lot
of situations where he might have —
1020
01:01:25,641 --> 01:01:28,436
Well, I mean,
people wanted to take care of him.
1021
01:01:31,856 --> 01:01:34,901
♪♪ [ Whistling ]
1022
01:01:34,984 --> 01:01:37,570
I found this in the trash, and it plays
"Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star"...
1023
01:01:37,653 --> 01:01:39,155
which I thought was kind of nice.
1024
01:01:39,238 --> 01:01:42,992
And my grandmother used to
call me "little lamb" all the time.
1025
01:01:43,076 --> 01:01:46,245
So it all clicked, you know,
all this synchronicity and stuff.
1026
01:01:46,329 --> 01:01:51,125
The pills. Also it has no eyes,
which I identify with that too.
1027
01:01:51,209 --> 01:01:52,849
[ Man ]
Billy is sort of the last beatnik.
1028
01:01:52,877 --> 01:01:57,131
And Billy sort of
held out for principles...
1029
01:01:57,215 --> 01:02:00,093
that are all in Jack Kerouac's
On the Road...
1030
01:02:00,176 --> 01:02:02,056
that everyone else had long
abandoned, you know?
1031
01:02:02,136 --> 01:02:06,641
Like, all the beatniks became
the hippies that became the yippies...
1032
01:02:06,724 --> 01:02:09,769
that became whatever
through the decades.
1033
01:02:09,852 --> 01:02:13,398
And Billy held on to these principles
in a certain way, you know...
1034
01:02:13,481 --> 01:02:16,150
of not wanting to compromise
in any sense...
1035
01:02:16,234 --> 01:02:19,237
as opposed to what everyone thought
the gods are...
1036
01:02:19,320 --> 01:02:22,365
which is William and Allen Ginsberg
and all those heroes.
1037
01:02:22,448 --> 01:02:26,702
All the men who had turned
every nuance into something
that supports them...
1038
01:02:26,786 --> 01:02:29,080
in some fashion,
either money or fame or this or that.
1039
01:02:29,163 --> 01:02:32,583
Joan, while she was pregnant,
was eating a lot of amphetamines.
1040
01:02:32,667 --> 01:02:35,086
So I don't know what effect
that had on his nervous system.
1041
01:02:35,169 --> 01:02:37,922
I saw his correspondence with Bill.
1042
01:02:38,005 --> 01:02:39,965
It was real easy to see
from his correspondence...
1043
01:02:40,007 --> 01:02:42,593
that there was a great ambivalence...
1044
01:02:42,677 --> 01:02:44,720
that — that — that William was a —
1045
01:02:44,804 --> 01:02:47,140
He loved Billy, Billy was his son...
1046
01:02:47,223 --> 01:02:50,685
and yet he didn't know how,
what he could do.
1047
01:02:50,768 --> 01:02:52,770
I knew that there had been
a lot going down...
1048
01:02:52,854 --> 01:02:55,940
before I ever came in the picture
and that Billy felt the same way.
1049
01:02:56,023 --> 01:03:00,194
He admired — In fact, almost to
Billy's detriment in some ways...
1050
01:03:00,278 --> 01:03:03,531
he admired William so much
that he wanted to be a writer himself.
1051
01:03:03,614 --> 01:03:09,954
I'd come, uh, back from New York
just in time to keep from dying.
1052
01:03:10,037 --> 01:03:13,249
I just wrote Speed
to figure out what had hit me.
1053
01:03:13,332 --> 01:03:14,959
The same thing
as writing down a dream.
1054
01:03:15,042 --> 01:03:18,963
I just wanted to know, uh,
keep track of the people that I'd met.
1055
01:03:19,046 --> 01:03:20,673
[ Ginsberg ]
There's a closet full of stuff.
1056
01:03:20,756 --> 01:03:25,344
And there was about two books
of prose and poetry...
1057
01:03:26,721 --> 01:03:28,181
which we're now typing up.
1058
01:03:28,264 --> 01:03:30,349
[ Man ] What is it
you went through last year, Billy?
1059
01:03:30,433 --> 01:03:32,768
Liver transplant...
1060
01:03:32,852 --> 01:03:34,979
which is one whopper
of an operation.
1061
01:03:35,062 --> 01:03:39,567
It was absolutely terrible.
It couldn't have been worse.
1062
01:03:40,735 --> 01:03:43,404
It — It — You know —
1063
01:03:43,488 --> 01:03:47,033
Made him an invalid, of course,
for the rest of his life.
1064
01:03:47,116 --> 01:03:54,415
And, um, he was really lucky
to live that long. It's, um —
1065
01:03:54,499 --> 01:03:56,000
Lots of them don't.
1066
01:03:56,083 --> 01:03:59,253
He had the liver transplant,
and he's completely wiped out.
1067
01:03:59,337 --> 01:04:01,714
And he's a junkie on top of it,
so he won't drink.
1068
01:04:01,797 --> 01:04:04,509
And then he's an alcoholic
on top of being a junkie.
1069
01:04:04,592 --> 01:04:08,262
And every time you see him
he's just almost in a state of collapse.
1070
01:04:08,346 --> 01:04:10,348
So a year and a half ago
I said to myself...
1071
01:04:10,431 --> 01:04:12,183
"This is really the last time
I'm gonna see you."
1072
01:04:12,266 --> 01:04:13,726
But it never was, you know.
1073
01:04:13,809 --> 01:04:16,938
Just like everyone who's, you know —
they go on forever.
1074
01:04:17,021 --> 01:04:22,151
Well, let's face it. Anyone who's
a devout Christian at this point...
1075
01:04:22,235 --> 01:04:25,488
is sort of beyond redemption.
1076
01:04:25,571 --> 01:04:29,200
I mean, holy shit.
I mean, who wants to hear about that?
1077
01:04:29,283 --> 01:04:34,705
Well, that depends on what kind of
concept they got of Christianity.
1078
01:04:34,789 --> 01:04:35,790
[ Coughs ]
1079
01:04:36,332 --> 01:04:41,712
One thing I've been exercising on is,
um, who gets a dime, or a quarter.
1080
01:04:41,796 --> 01:04:45,049
When I'm walking down the streets
with all the spare changers...
1081
01:04:45,132 --> 01:04:47,051
and it's getting to be fun.
1082
01:04:47,134 --> 01:04:49,637
This guy's got a more honest attitude,
and this and that.
1083
01:04:49,720 --> 01:04:52,765
And one guy came up and said,
"Give me a fucking quarter.
I'm a wino."
1084
01:04:52,848 --> 01:04:56,936
[ Laughs, Coughs ]
So he got his quarter real quick.
1085
01:04:57,019 --> 01:05:01,440
It's an old, old technique.
You shouldn't fall for it.
1086
01:05:01,524 --> 01:05:03,150
[ Coughing ]
This guy, you should have seen him.
1087
01:05:03,234 --> 01:05:05,778
Tell him — Just hand him
the Town and Country.
1088
01:05:05,861 --> 01:05:08,406
There's a whole section in there
on work in Boulder.
1089
01:05:08,489 --> 01:05:11,742
Also, there's a —
1090
01:05:11,826 --> 01:05:15,746
Down the street there
there's a dishwasher wanted sign.
1091
01:05:15,830 --> 01:05:20,668
- Where is it?
- In that, um, greasy Greek restaurant.
1092
01:05:20,751 --> 01:05:22,920
- Um — Um —
- Dino's?
1093
01:05:23,004 --> 01:05:25,131
Nah, they won't hire me,
'cause I was in there...
1094
01:05:25,214 --> 01:05:29,260
back when I was doing
a lot of drinking a couple of times...
1095
01:05:29,343 --> 01:05:31,429
and I applied once
and the guy remembered me.
1096
01:05:31,512 --> 01:05:33,097
He took one look and said,
"Forget it."
1097
01:05:33,180 --> 01:05:35,808
Well, you gotta apply anyway.
1098
01:05:40,479 --> 01:05:44,483
There's one thing
I wanted to ask you. How's Al?
1099
01:05:44,567 --> 01:05:46,444
- Who?
- How's Allen?
1100
01:05:46,527 --> 01:05:48,446
I don't know. I haven't seen him.
1101
01:05:49,780 --> 01:05:53,117
- You're going tomorrow.
- I'll see you before I do.
1102
01:05:53,200 --> 01:05:55,369
- You will?
- Yeah.
1103
01:05:55,453 --> 01:05:58,497
- You'll drop by?
- Yeah, I will.
1104
01:05:58,581 --> 01:06:01,292
- That's a beautiful coat, Bill, really.
- Isn't it hot?
1105
01:06:01,375 --> 01:06:05,129
Yeah, it looks like, um,
the Yukon, you know.
1106
01:06:05,212 --> 01:06:08,633
Yeah, like that guy —
Okay, the bill torn.
1107
01:06:08,716 --> 01:06:10,551
I won't say.
1108
01:06:11,093 --> 01:06:12,386
Well?
1109
01:06:12,470 --> 01:06:14,347
- Good night.
- Good night.
1110
01:06:14,430 --> 01:06:15,950
- Good night, Bill.
- Good night, Bill.
1111
01:06:16,015 --> 01:06:17,558
Sweet dreams.
1112
01:06:18,392 --> 01:06:19,852
Nice seeing you.
1113
01:06:19,935 --> 01:06:21,896
[ Grauerholz ]
Thanks for coming down.
1114
01:06:25,566 --> 01:06:27,068
- Good night.
- Good night.
1115
01:06:32,073 --> 01:06:35,493
He was sitting in his robe
at the big table in the bunker...
1116
01:06:35,576 --> 01:06:37,912
having some toast and coffee
for breakfast.
1117
01:06:37,995 --> 01:06:39,595
He finished that,
and he had a cigarette.
1118
01:06:39,664 --> 01:06:44,001
And I said, "Bill, I have some
very bad news, but I have to tell you.
1119
01:06:44,085 --> 01:06:46,837
Billy died this morning."
1120
01:06:46,921 --> 01:06:49,382
And he got up from the table
and walked into his room.
1121
01:06:50,591 --> 01:06:53,719
I knew that he was in there, feeling
and remembering all the years...
1122
01:06:53,803 --> 01:06:55,346
that Billy had been his son.
1123
01:06:55,429 --> 01:06:59,016
Everything would come back to him
in a moment like that.
1124
01:06:59,100 --> 01:07:05,731
Now that he is gone,
I feel like I'm a son to William.
1125
01:07:06,482 --> 01:07:09,360
I think he was very fond of Willy.
1126
01:07:09,443 --> 01:07:14,073
There was a kind of unspoken charm
between them.
1127
01:07:14,156 --> 01:07:16,367
'Cause they were very much alike
in temperament.
1128
01:07:16,450 --> 01:07:19,578
Billy Jr. was quite a great writer
and quite a sharp mind.
1129
01:07:19,662 --> 01:07:24,250
Brilliant pantomimist, or imitator,
or inimitable —
1130
01:07:24,333 --> 01:07:26,836
you know, as a prose writer.
1131
01:07:26,919 --> 01:07:30,047
He had a good sense
of dialect and fact.
1132
01:07:30,131 --> 01:07:32,550
An amazingly factual writer,
like his father.
1133
01:07:33,467 --> 01:07:36,721
So I — I don't know
what effect it has on Bill.
1134
01:07:36,804 --> 01:07:40,933
He doesn't —
He seems to be stoic about it...
1135
01:07:42,101 --> 01:07:45,730
[ Burroughs ]
"Kim decides to go west
and become a shootist.
1136
01:07:45,813 --> 01:07:50,025
If anyone doesn't like the way
he acts and looks and smells...
1137
01:07:50,109 --> 01:07:54,155
they can fill their grubby peasant paw.
1138
01:07:54,238 --> 01:07:56,907
Kim's training as a shootist begins.
1139
01:07:56,991 --> 01:08:03,539
He meets a wise old assassin,
whispering Kes Mayfield.
1140
01:08:03,622 --> 01:08:06,459
The old man didn't seem to hear.
1141
01:08:06,542 --> 01:08:09,170
He spoke to the air in front of him.
1142
01:08:09,253 --> 01:08:13,507
Your hand and your eyes know
a lot more about shootin' than you do.
1143
01:08:13,591 --> 01:08:16,302
Just learn to stand out of the way.
1144
01:08:16,385 --> 01:08:22,767
His empty eyes, old, unbluffed,
unreadable, rest on Kim.
1145
01:08:22,850 --> 01:08:28,606
'City boy, did you ever see
a dog roll in carrion?'
1146
01:08:28,689 --> 01:08:31,192
'Yes, sir.
I was tempted to join him, sir.'
1147
01:08:32,610 --> 01:08:35,529
'Kim, if you had your choice,
would you rather be...
1148
01:08:35,613 --> 01:08:38,532
a poisonous snake or nonpoisonous?'
1149
01:08:38,616 --> 01:08:43,454
'Oh, poisonous, sir, like
a green mamba or a spitting cobra.'
1150
01:08:43,537 --> 01:08:46,874
'Why?'
'I'd feel safer, sir.'
1151
01:08:46,957 --> 01:08:49,543
'And that's your idea of heaven,
feeling safer?'
1152
01:08:49,627 --> 01:08:51,337
'Yes, sir.'
1153
01:08:51,420 --> 01:08:54,298
'Is a poisonous snake really safer?'
1154
01:08:54,381 --> 01:08:57,968
'Not really. But he must feel good
after he bites someone.
1155
01:08:58,052 --> 01:09:03,474
Safer? Yes, sir. Dead people are
less frightening than live ones.'
1156
01:09:03,557 --> 01:09:06,352
'Young man,
I think you're an assassin.'
1157
01:09:06,435 --> 01:09:08,312
'I want to be one, sir.'"
1158
01:09:09,355 --> 01:09:13,984
Well, I would use any weapons
at my disposal...
1159
01:09:14,068 --> 01:09:18,072
in order to defend my premises.
1160
01:09:21,033 --> 01:09:23,869
I wouldn't hesitate.
Wouldn't hesitate at all.
1161
01:09:24,537 --> 01:09:26,914
Well, we'll try this one.
1162
01:09:35,464 --> 01:09:36,632
- [ Blows ]
- [ Dart Lands ]
1163
01:09:36,715 --> 01:09:40,261
Did it stick? I heard it plop.
Yes, it did.
1164
01:09:52,356 --> 01:09:55,651
I'm shooting just right
up the middle of this thing.
1165
01:09:57,361 --> 01:10:00,906
This is my, uh, steel cobra.
1166
01:10:02,449 --> 01:10:04,201
- Should I demonstrate it?
- [ Man ] Yes, please.
1167
01:10:04,285 --> 01:10:07,162
Stand back. Stand back.
1168
01:10:07,246 --> 01:10:10,749
This is, uh — It's the spring blackjack.
1169
01:10:10,833 --> 01:10:14,211
Now it's in probe position, see?
[ Grunts ]
1170
01:10:14,295 --> 01:10:18,841
If I were starting from scratch,
I'd hit him across the face...
1171
01:10:18,924 --> 01:10:20,384
and see how that went.
1172
01:10:20,467 --> 01:10:25,723
So instead of that, if you had
a razor-sharp, double-edged knife...
1173
01:10:25,806 --> 01:10:27,933
you could whip it out
and cut someone's throat...
1174
01:10:28,017 --> 01:10:30,936
before he knew what was happening...
1175
01:10:31,020 --> 01:10:33,188
right in the middle of a sentence.
1176
01:10:34,356 --> 01:10:38,235
You see, I don't wanna hear what
you've got to say and, whoomp.
1177
01:10:45,993 --> 01:10:52,416
This knife is nice, but my one
in the bank vault is so much better.
1178
01:10:52,499 --> 01:10:53,500
[ Man ]
Mm-hmm.
1179
01:10:53,584 --> 01:10:57,129
But that could certainly
confound a mugger.
1180
01:10:57,212 --> 01:10:58,464
[ Chuckles ]
1181
01:10:58,547 --> 01:11:01,258
He with his little puny switchblade.
1182
01:11:01,342 --> 01:11:03,302
Oh, here it is. Yes.
1183
01:11:05,512 --> 01:11:08,307
Now that's a regular blackjack.
1184
01:11:08,390 --> 01:11:11,810
A blackjack is an elegant weapon.
1185
01:11:11,894 --> 01:11:14,063
[ Man ] Well, I think
you're ready for any invasions.
1186
01:11:14,146 --> 01:11:18,734
I hope so, yes.
I'm not anticipating any trouble...
1187
01:11:18,817 --> 01:11:21,654
'cause I don't like violence.
1188
01:11:32,873 --> 01:11:36,669
[ Burroughs ] The bunker here
has virtually no windows.
1189
01:11:36,752 --> 01:11:39,171
And, uh — But as soon as I saw it...
1190
01:11:39,254 --> 01:11:42,007
I said that
it was suitable for my purposes.
1191
01:11:42,091 --> 01:11:46,136
It's quiet and secluded.
1192
01:11:47,554 --> 01:11:52,309
And it's very warm in winter
and very cool in summer...
1193
01:11:52,393 --> 01:11:57,064
because the walls are thick
and it's well insulated.
1194
01:12:01,902 --> 01:12:07,324
Um, I know that some
of my guests here have seen a ghost.
1195
01:12:07,408 --> 01:12:09,326
I gave it the name Toby.
1196
01:12:09,410 --> 01:12:13,539
I can't say that
I have seen this apparition...
1197
01:12:13,622 --> 01:12:17,209
but I've been aware of its existence.
1198
01:12:17,292 --> 01:12:21,922
This, of course, used to be
a locker room in a YMCA.
1199
01:12:22,006 --> 01:12:24,883
This room, and we would assume...
1200
01:12:24,967 --> 01:12:29,263
that it might be a ghost
left over from that period.
1201
01:12:38,147 --> 01:12:41,025
Well, actually I don't have
a hard and fast schedule...
1202
01:12:41,108 --> 01:12:43,569
but if I'm working and working well —
1203
01:12:43,652 --> 01:12:46,155
I usually get started on my work.
1204
01:12:46,238 --> 01:12:48,449
I get up about 9:00.
1205
01:12:48,532 --> 01:12:51,285
Then I'm ready to work
by 10:00 or 10:30...
1206
01:12:51,368 --> 01:12:54,496
and I will work through,
more or less...
1207
01:12:54,580 --> 01:12:58,333
until 6:00 in the evening.
1208
01:12:58,417 --> 01:13:00,252
I don't usually work at night.
1209
01:13:00,335 --> 01:13:02,421
And see, I don't eat lunch normally...
1210
01:13:02,504 --> 01:13:06,091
or I may just have a sandwich
or a snack in my room.
1211
01:13:06,175 --> 01:13:10,012
But normally I don't eat lunch.
So that is the time in which I work.
1212
01:13:10,095 --> 01:13:13,348
The late morning
and the early afternoon.
1213
01:13:13,974 --> 01:13:17,102
[ Man ] And then
what do you do in the evening?
1214
01:13:17,186 --> 01:13:20,689
Well, various things.
1215
01:13:20,773 --> 01:13:24,443
Visit friends, have dinner, read...
1216
01:13:24,526 --> 01:13:27,905
watch television sometimes,
if there's anything interesting.
1217
01:13:27,988 --> 01:13:35,037
Various, rather mundane
and trivial occupations and activities.
1218
01:13:35,120 --> 01:13:38,916
I'm the old Irish tenor
brought back from the grave.
1219
01:13:38,999 --> 01:13:41,710
What about one of
the really good Irish tunes?
1220
01:13:41,794 --> 01:13:44,129
♪ Oh, Danny boy ♪
1221
01:13:44,213 --> 01:13:51,428
- ♪ The pipes, the pipes are calling ♪
- ♪♪ [ Humming ]
1222
01:13:51,512 --> 01:13:59,353
♪ From glen to dale
and down the mountainside ♪
1223
01:13:59,436 --> 01:14:02,106
- ♪ Oh, Danny boy ♪
- These were all registered recorded...
1224
01:14:02,189 --> 01:14:04,108
- copyrighted—
- ♪ Oh, Danny boy ♪
1225
01:14:04,191 --> 01:14:08,862
I don't want Burt Bacharach
to start stealing our stuff.
1226
01:14:08,946 --> 01:14:09,947
♪ Oh, Danny boy ♪
1227
01:14:10,030 --> 01:14:15,494
♪ Oh, Danny boy,
I love you so ♪♪
1228
01:14:15,577 --> 01:14:18,038
- Are you making this up?
- No, I am not.
1229
01:14:18,122 --> 01:14:21,125
[ Laughing ]
That is the truth.
1230
01:14:21,208 --> 01:14:25,629
Well, I work in
a number of different ways.
1231
01:14:25,712 --> 01:14:27,339
It depends upon where I am.
1232
01:14:27,422 --> 01:14:31,093
Sometimes I'm working
from some notes I made.
1233
01:14:31,176 --> 01:14:33,846
Sometimes I'll get up in the night
and make notes...
1234
01:14:33,929 --> 01:14:36,974
and work on those the next day.
1235
01:14:37,057 --> 01:14:40,060
Or I may know pretty well
where I am in the narrative...
1236
01:14:40,144 --> 01:14:43,105
and I can go right on from there.
1237
01:14:44,773 --> 01:14:47,151
There will be long periods in which —
1238
01:14:47,234 --> 01:14:50,654
Well, not so long,
but, say, a month or so...
1239
01:14:50,737 --> 01:14:54,408
sometimes more,
in which it's very difficult to write.
1240
01:14:54,491 --> 01:14:57,536
And I've found that the remedy
is not to try and force yourself...
1241
01:14:57,619 --> 01:15:00,998
but to do something else,
to do editing...
1242
01:15:01,081 --> 01:15:04,168
reading or some other activity.
1243
01:15:04,251 --> 01:15:06,211
[ Man ] How long have you
been keeping scrapbooks?
1244
01:15:06,253 --> 01:15:11,592
[ Burroughs ]
Oh, I started years and years ago,
about 10 years ago, no 15 years ago.
1245
01:15:11,675 --> 01:15:15,679
But they develop. This one is,
I think, much more precise.
1246
01:15:15,762 --> 01:15:19,474
At first I just sort of
put things in that interested me...
1247
01:15:19,558 --> 01:15:22,895
and now I have to have
a very definite reason...
1248
01:15:22,978 --> 01:15:27,858
for a picture or news item
to go into the scrapbook.
1249
01:15:27,941 --> 01:15:30,485
I keep files. I say,
"There is something I may use"...
1250
01:15:30,569 --> 01:15:36,116
but it may be a year or two years
before I find a place to use it.
1251
01:15:39,703 --> 01:15:44,917
I began writing dreams down
long before I began to write.
1252
01:15:45,000 --> 01:15:49,046
For example,
I meet a character in a dream.
1253
01:15:49,129 --> 01:15:55,093
Then I may find a photo that
has something of the character in it.
1254
01:15:56,261 --> 01:15:59,890
Over a period of years,
I've filled a number of scrapbooks...
1255
01:15:59,973 --> 01:16:03,685
with these identikit pictures.
1256
01:16:03,769 --> 01:16:07,064
Usually my characters
are composites...
1257
01:16:07,147 --> 01:16:10,234
of many people from dreams...
1258
01:16:10,317 --> 01:16:12,736
photos, people I know...
1259
01:16:12,819 --> 01:16:17,407
and quite frequently, of course,
characters in writing.
1260
01:16:17,491 --> 01:16:21,078
[ Burroughs ] "Here is
Arthur Thom Robb — T-H-O-M —
1261
01:16:21,161 --> 01:16:26,250
chairman of the White People's
Committee to Restore God's Law.
1262
01:16:26,333 --> 01:16:28,252
And he's a good ol' boy too.
1263
01:16:28,335 --> 01:16:32,381
Not a finer man in Bass, Arkansas,
than old Thom Robb.
1264
01:16:32,464 --> 01:16:37,761
After praising the courageous Anita,
he gets down to committee business.
1265
01:16:37,844 --> 01:16:40,931
'White People's Committee
is not embarrassed to admit...
1266
01:16:41,014 --> 01:16:45,769
that we endorse and seek
the execution of all homosexuals.
1267
01:16:45,852 --> 01:16:48,563
God's law calls for the death penalty...
1268
01:16:48,647 --> 01:16:51,024
for the faggot slime,
the whole filthy lot of them.'
1269
01:16:52,025 --> 01:16:57,114
He is also the publisher of
a book called The Negro, a Beast...
1270
01:16:57,197 --> 01:17:04,121
and his rag is replete with references
to, quote, 'rabid sex-perverted Jews.'
1271
01:17:04,204 --> 01:17:06,123
He's gonna apply God's law...
1272
01:17:06,206 --> 01:17:09,584
to the Jews, the blacks,
the Hispanics and the Chinese.
1273
01:17:09,668 --> 01:17:12,546
Done bit hisself off quite a tamale.
1274
01:17:13,255 --> 01:17:17,467
About 50 million folks he's gonna kill,
some of whom might even resist."
1275
01:17:17,551 --> 01:17:25,309
My old assassin in
"Tio Mate Smiles" in The Wild Boys —
1276
01:17:25,392 --> 01:17:29,980
I would like to kill somebody
before I die...
1277
01:17:30,063 --> 01:17:34,651
and I hope it's, you know,
preferably one of these fag baiters.
1278
01:17:34,735 --> 01:17:37,195
Gay state. That's what I'm aiming for.
1279
01:17:37,279 --> 01:17:40,782
And I want us to be as tough
as the Israelis.
1280
01:17:40,866 --> 01:17:45,078
Anybody fucks around
with a gay anyplace in the world,
we're gonna be there.
1281
01:17:46,038 --> 01:17:47,873
Well, we're a minority.
1282
01:17:47,956 --> 01:17:50,417
Why the hell don't we have the right
to protect ourselves?
1283
01:17:50,500 --> 01:17:55,380
Let's build up an international
organization with false passports...
1284
01:17:57,924 --> 01:18:00,302
guns on arrival.
1285
01:18:00,385 --> 01:18:03,597
The whole lot — the whole terrorist lot.
1286
01:18:03,680 --> 01:18:05,807
We are a precarious minority.
1287
01:18:05,891 --> 01:18:08,935
We gotta fight for our lives,
you understand?
1288
01:18:09,770 --> 01:18:14,191
If they oppose the gay state...
1289
01:18:14,274 --> 01:18:18,278
we're gonna find 'em,
track 'em down and kill 'em.
1290
01:18:23,617 --> 01:18:25,285
Why not?
1291
01:18:25,369 --> 01:18:29,081
"Yes, this world would be a pretty
easy and pleasant-like place to live...
1292
01:18:29,164 --> 01:18:33,543
if everybody could just mind his own
business and let others do the same.
1293
01:18:33,627 --> 01:18:36,588
But a wise old black faggot
said to me years ago...
1294
01:18:36,671 --> 01:18:39,216
'Some people are shits, darling.'
1295
01:18:39,299 --> 01:18:42,427
I was never able to forget it."
1296
01:18:43,804 --> 01:18:49,476
I owe my good health
at a rather advanced age...
1297
01:18:49,559 --> 01:18:52,562
after some lapses
of what some people...
1298
01:18:52,646 --> 01:18:55,649
would call into unhealthy conduct...
1299
01:18:55,732 --> 01:19:00,779
as entirely due to the orgone box.
1300
01:19:00,862 --> 01:19:03,490
Not much light in here.
It's a little spooky.
1301
01:19:03,573 --> 01:19:09,079
He said it gave off
this strange blue light.
1302
01:19:09,162 --> 01:19:11,623
- Damn. Well, that looks like —
- Would you like to get in there, Terry?
1303
01:19:11,706 --> 01:19:13,959
- I'll get in there with you, William.
- I'll get in.
1304
01:19:14,042 --> 01:19:16,670
- All right. I'll get in there with you.
- Okay.
1305
01:19:16,753 --> 01:19:19,589
- I'll get in back. You get in front.
- Okay.
1306
01:19:19,673 --> 01:19:23,760
- Don't you try and, you know —
- Don't you worry, Terry.
1307
01:19:23,844 --> 01:19:25,512
All right. Let's close this for a minute.
1308
01:19:25,595 --> 01:19:30,142
Close the door. We gotta get
our orgones here organized!
1309
01:19:30,225 --> 01:19:32,185
[ Southern Murmurs ]
1310
01:19:32,269 --> 01:19:34,729
- Yeah. Good.
- I feel it.
1311
01:19:34,813 --> 01:19:36,773
You can feel it, yes.
1312
01:19:36,857 --> 01:19:39,109
[ Southern ]
Well, I don't know about that.
1313
01:19:39,192 --> 01:19:41,361
[ Burroughs ]
Sort of tingling.
1314
01:19:42,404 --> 01:19:44,324
[ Southern ]
That's not — That might be the dope.
1315
01:19:44,406 --> 01:19:47,451
[ Burroughs ] I think — Yeah. Well,
maybe you've had enough exposure.
1316
01:19:47,534 --> 01:19:51,413
- I think the first exposure
should not be too long.
- Is that a cut there?
1317
01:19:51,496 --> 01:19:57,461
I wouldn't want you to be overexposed
to these potent rays...
1318
01:19:57,544 --> 01:20:01,590
- which are unlike —
- I'll tell you one thing, I wouldn't
want to spend my life in there.
1319
01:20:01,673 --> 01:20:04,426
Like California, I like to visit it,
but I don't wanna live there.
1320
01:20:05,719 --> 01:20:09,514
The rays given off by radiation,
these are beneficent.
1321
01:20:09,598 --> 01:20:11,349
It's a beneficent radiation.
1322
01:20:11,433 --> 01:20:14,811
- Ah, yes. Well, I feel a little better.
- I'm sure you do.
1323
01:20:26,615 --> 01:20:29,826
[ No Audible Dialogue ]
1324
01:20:41,171 --> 01:20:43,757
Great poet and prophet...
1325
01:20:43,840 --> 01:20:48,428
and perhaps the most
influential writer of our times...
1326
01:20:48,512 --> 01:20:52,349
grand, groovy and beloved
William Burroughs.
1327
01:20:52,432 --> 01:20:57,062
[ Applauding, Cheering ]
1328
01:21:13,286 --> 01:21:14,871
Thank you.
1329
01:21:21,336 --> 01:21:24,881
Well, I'm sorry that Dr. Benway
can't be here in person...
1330
01:21:24,965 --> 01:21:28,343
but he does send a message.
1331
01:21:28,426 --> 01:21:31,346
"I am a practitioner of medicine.
1332
01:21:31,429 --> 01:21:36,893
I learn from my patients,
and my patients learn from me.
1333
01:21:36,977 --> 01:21:42,816
I am glad to report that everything is
now well under control in Jonestown...
1334
01:21:42,899 --> 01:21:47,612
and I have a few more calls
to make tonight."
1335
01:21:47,696 --> 01:21:50,031
[ Cheering ]
1336
01:21:51,324 --> 01:21:53,410
[ Man ] But you, William Burroughs...
1337
01:21:53,493 --> 01:21:55,161
you realize that your body...
1338
01:21:55,245 --> 01:21:57,163
you're moving towards death.
1339
01:21:57,247 --> 01:22:02,794
I wonder, just finally, will death
come to you as a kind of cheat?
1340
01:22:02,877 --> 01:22:04,546
Do you think
"I'm cheated of more experience"...
1341
01:22:04,629 --> 01:22:06,881
or will you think, "What a relief!"
1342
01:22:06,965 --> 01:22:11,261
No, neither.
Um, quoting again from my book...
1343
01:22:11,344 --> 01:22:16,016
"Kim felt that immortality was
the only goal worth striving for."
1344
01:22:16,891 --> 01:22:21,313
Um, I feel that an afterlife
is quite a possibility.
1345
01:22:21,396 --> 01:22:23,898
It depends on you.
[ Clears Throat ]
1346
01:22:26,276 --> 01:22:28,820
- I've just finished.
- [ Chuckles ]
1347
01:22:28,903 --> 01:22:29,904
Time Out.
1348
01:22:29,988 --> 01:22:31,615
I just happened to get that number...
1349
01:22:31,698 --> 01:22:34,034
with you on the cover.
1350
01:22:34,117 --> 01:22:38,455
That's really how I knew that you
were first here before you rang me.
1351
01:22:38,538 --> 01:22:40,832
But, um, it's, um —
1352
01:22:40,915 --> 01:22:45,462
I was interested in what you said,
that, um, you really write
to make people aware...
1353
01:22:45,545 --> 01:22:47,005
what they know themselves.
1354
01:22:47,088 --> 01:22:50,592
Well, that is perfectly true.
I haven't got — I just paint.
1355
01:22:50,675 --> 01:22:53,303
Just not for that reason at all.
I just paint...
1356
01:22:53,386 --> 01:22:56,765
to try and excite myself,
which doesn't often happen.
1357
01:22:58,391 --> 01:23:00,518
[ Burroughs ]
One of my more successful readings...
1358
01:23:00,602 --> 01:23:04,564
is on the whole mummy idea.
1359
01:23:04,648 --> 01:23:09,444
See, their belief was that
you had to have a mummy
in order to be immortal.
1360
01:23:09,569 --> 01:23:15,492
If anything happened
to your mummy, your immortality
was completely nullified...
1361
01:23:15,575 --> 01:23:18,995
which seems
a pretty extraordinary idea...
1362
01:23:19,746 --> 01:23:23,500
and a very precarious
sort of immortality.
1363
01:23:23,583 --> 01:23:25,669
"The most precarious...
1364
01:23:25,752 --> 01:23:28,338
shortsighted, unpleasant...
1365
01:23:28,421 --> 01:23:33,551
and downright stupid
immortality blueprint...
1366
01:23:33,635 --> 01:23:37,430
was drafted by the ancient Egyptians.
1367
01:23:37,514 --> 01:23:42,977
First, you had to
get yourself mummified,
and that was very expensive...
1368
01:23:43,061 --> 01:23:47,857
making immortality
a monopoly of the truly rich."
1369
01:23:47,941 --> 01:23:49,192
[ Laughter ]
1370
01:23:49,275 --> 01:23:52,612
"Well, here is plain G.I. Ollie.
1371
01:23:52,696 --> 01:23:57,283
He's got enough baraka —
that's sort of vigor and vitality —
1372
01:23:57,367 --> 01:23:59,411
to survive his physical death.
1373
01:23:59,494 --> 01:24:01,579
Well, he won't get far.
1374
01:24:03,039 --> 01:24:06,960
He's got no mummy,
he's got no name, he's got nothing.
1375
01:24:07,836 --> 01:24:13,883
What happens to a bum like that?
A nameless, mummiless asshole?
1376
01:24:13,967 --> 01:24:18,054
Demons will swarm all over him
at the first checkpoint.
1377
01:24:18,138 --> 01:24:21,391
Mummies are sittin' ducks.
1378
01:24:21,474 --> 01:24:24,561
No matter who you are,
what can happen to your mummy...
1379
01:24:24,644 --> 01:24:27,105
is a pharaoh's nightmare.
1380
01:24:27,188 --> 01:24:31,234
The dreaded mummy bashers
and grave robbers...
1381
01:24:31,317 --> 01:24:37,574
scavengers, floods, volcanoes,
earthquakes, explosions.
1382
01:24:37,657 --> 01:24:41,745
'For Ra's sakes, get us
into the vaults!' they scream...
1383
01:24:41,828 --> 01:24:45,165
without a throat, without a tongue...
1384
01:24:45,248 --> 01:24:48,793
a silent scream of abject terror.
1385
01:24:49,711 --> 01:24:54,257
Now perhaps a mummy's best friend
is an Egyptologist."
1386
01:24:54,340 --> 01:24:58,136
That's why they — Of course, that's
how they produce this marvelous stuff.
1387
01:24:58,219 --> 01:24:59,804
'Cause in a way, they thought —
1388
01:24:59,888 --> 01:25:04,768
Because a lot of that stuff was
not made by individual artists.
1389
01:25:04,851 --> 01:25:07,312
It was just made by
a lot of workmen, you know...
1390
01:25:07,395 --> 01:25:13,276
who were working on prolonging,
as it were, the idea of prolonging life.
1391
01:25:13,359 --> 01:25:16,196
Well, they were working on
prolonging someone else's life.
1392
01:25:16,279 --> 01:25:20,283
Someone else's. Exactly.
Yes, they got a raw deal, didn't they?
1393
01:25:20,366 --> 01:25:22,577
A very raw deal.
1394
01:25:22,660 --> 01:25:24,204
A very raw deal indeed.
1395
01:25:24,287 --> 01:25:26,706
[ Typing ]
1396
01:25:27,707 --> 01:25:31,461
[ Burroughs ]
"Daddy Long Legs looked like
Uncle Sam on stilts...
1397
01:25:31,544 --> 01:25:35,799
and he ran this osteopath clinic
outside East St. Louis...
1398
01:25:35,882 --> 01:25:39,093
and took in a few junkie patients.
1399
01:25:39,177 --> 01:25:43,598
Doc Benway and me was holed up
there after a rumble in Dallas...
1400
01:25:43,681 --> 01:25:46,726
involving this aphrodisiac ointment...
1401
01:25:46,810 --> 01:25:51,314
and Doc goofed on ether
and mixed in too much Spanish Fly...
1402
01:25:51,397 --> 01:25:54,901
and burned the prick off
the police commissioner.
1403
01:25:55,443 --> 01:25:59,364
So we come to Daddy Long Legs
to cool off.
1404
01:25:59,447 --> 01:26:03,284
One day, we were sittin' out in
the lawn chairs with lap robes —
1405
01:26:03,368 --> 01:26:04,828
it was a fall day —
1406
01:26:04,911 --> 01:26:08,414
leaves turning, sun cold on the lake.
1407
01:26:08,498 --> 01:26:11,709
Doc picks up a piece of grass.
1408
01:26:11,793 --> 01:26:17,257
'Junk turns you on vegetable.
It's green, see?
1409
01:26:17,340 --> 01:26:21,845
A green fix should last a long time.'
1410
01:26:21,928 --> 01:26:24,806
We check out of the clinic
and rent a house...
1411
01:26:24,889 --> 01:26:28,518
and Doc starts cooking up
this green junk.
1412
01:26:28,601 --> 01:26:33,523
The basement is full of tanks,
smell like a compost heap of junkies.
1413
01:26:33,606 --> 01:26:37,360
So finally he draws off
this heavy green fluid...
1414
01:26:37,443 --> 01:26:41,489
and loads it into a hypo
big as a bicycle pump.
1415
01:26:41,573 --> 01:26:45,743
'Now, we must find a worthy vessel,'
he says.
1416
01:26:45,827 --> 01:26:48,371
We flush out this old goofball artist...
1417
01:26:48,454 --> 01:26:54,002
and tell him it is pure Chinese "H"
from the Ling Dynasty...
1418
01:26:54,085 --> 01:26:58,882
and Doc shoots the whole pint
of green right into the mainline...
1419
01:26:58,965 --> 01:27:02,051
and the yellow jacket
turns fibrous gray-green...
1420
01:27:02,135 --> 01:27:04,804
and withers up like an old turnip.
1421
01:27:04,888 --> 01:27:07,473
And I say, 'I'm gettin' out of
here, me.'
1422
01:27:07,557 --> 01:27:12,437
And Doc says,
'An unworthy vessel, obviously.
1423
01:27:12,520 --> 01:27:14,480
I withdraw from the case.'"
1424
01:27:14,564 --> 01:27:21,237
[ Woman ]
♪ Oh, it's a long, long while ♪
1425
01:27:21,321 --> 01:27:22,780
♪ From May to December ♪
1426
01:27:22,864 --> 01:27:26,910
You know, this is nice. You can come
back and settle down with one's cats.
1427
01:27:26,993 --> 01:27:30,163
♪ And the days grow short ♪
1428
01:27:30,246 --> 01:27:33,374
Plant asparagus beds and birdseed.
1429
01:27:33,458 --> 01:27:38,171
- I mean, excuse me, grass seed.
- [ Chuckles ]
1430
01:27:38,254 --> 01:27:40,632
Well, it'll be birdseed
if we don't get it in pretty soon.
1431
01:27:40,715 --> 01:27:44,135
Hunting and fishing, you know.
1432
01:27:45,637 --> 01:27:47,805
Come here, Russki.
1433
01:27:48,598 --> 01:27:50,141
[ Clicking Teeth ]
1434
01:27:51,267 --> 01:27:53,478
Ah, very well.
1435
01:27:53,561 --> 01:27:55,688
That better be good enough.
1436
01:28:06,199 --> 01:28:08,201
Good cat, Russki.
1437
01:28:09,535 --> 01:28:11,037
[ Clicks Teeth ]
1438
01:28:22,090 --> 01:28:24,175
♪ And these few precious days ♪♪
1439
01:28:24,258 --> 01:28:28,972
I'd like to kill a pheasant, and
Kansas is known for its pheasants.
1440
01:28:29,055 --> 01:28:32,058
Oh, yes. Oh, yes. And
pheasant season's coming up too.
1441
01:28:32,141 --> 01:28:34,519
- I know it is.
- Wayne knows all about that stuff.
1442
01:28:34,602 --> 01:28:36,646
Well, you'll —
1443
01:28:36,729 --> 01:28:39,524
By God, get out and kill a pheasant.
1444
01:28:39,607 --> 01:28:42,193
- If it's the last thing we do.
- Yes, absolutely.
1445
01:28:42,276 --> 01:28:44,237
I will do this then.
1446
01:28:44,320 --> 01:28:49,200
You have to be awfully careful
cooking pheasants.
1447
01:28:49,283 --> 01:28:51,995
- They tend to get dry.
- Mmm.
1448
01:28:52,078 --> 01:28:53,538
Same problem with quail.
1449
01:28:53,621 --> 01:28:57,041
- I almost forgot. We have to cook it.
- What?
1450
01:28:57,125 --> 01:28:59,502
- Oh, we have to cook it and eat it.
- Well, naturally.
1451
01:28:59,585 --> 01:29:01,713
That's the whole point.
1452
01:29:01,796 --> 01:29:06,009
That's the whole point
in killing a bird is to eat it.
1453
01:29:06,092 --> 01:29:09,554
I wouldn't kill anything I didn't
intend to eat, except a possum.
1454
01:29:09,637 --> 01:29:11,723
- [ Sniffs ]
- [ Laughs ]