The significance of Wm. S. Burroughs is that he embodied America in the 20th century. Now that he is gone, we are living in afteramerica. Peace.

I was first introduced to William S. Burroughs about ten years ago when I stumbled across the album "You're The Guy I Want to Share My Money with," which also featured Laurie Anderson and John Giorno. I blew alot of minds with that record, I seemed to be the first person I knew who had ever heard of him. I patiently read Naked Lunch twice and appreciated the fact that it was not an easy read.

The thing I enjoyed the most about him was his sense of humor, and the fact that he was a consummate storyteller, artist, and eternal iconoclast. Few Americans stand out as he (note: present tense) does.

He is greatly missed.

It has been a sad year, with Timothy, Allen, and now William passing.
I'm only 29, and really am too young to have experienced these three except towards the end of their lives, but they have made a very significant indelible mark on my life. I always admired their personal strength, creativity, and individuality. I guess I try to approach life with some of their thoughts to form my experiences and perspectives.
I now wish I would have taken a trip out to Lawrence last summer when I was in Kansas City (about 45 mins. away), and perhaps call on WSB if nothing else just to say Hi. We'll all miss you, William.

When Wild Bill saddled up and rode out of town Saturday evening , he took a great many other folks with him. Inspector Lee, Kim Carsons, El Hombre Invisible, Meester Weeli and all the rest posse'd out alongside him.
Now, I'm not much for Eulogizin' but I would like to offer my gratitude to Bill for his attempts to "wise up the marks" and for teaching us something about being a Johnson in the process.
Besides being a great and dedicated writer, he was a mythmaker, dreammapper, painter, shootist, man of knowledge and intrepid explorer of psychic space.He was also the archetypal punk and the hippest guy around, and most all of us (post) moderns owe him an a sizable debt.
So, adios Bill, and thanks for everything. I trust your reassignment will be fruitful.

"You cannot estimate the damage..."

I feel this death to be shocking and very final. His work and readings reached inside my soul and provided a tactile sense for thought and speech that I had never experienced before. It established a new frame of reference through which I could better understand most works of art.

It is strange, but I feel that we have all been finally, completely severed from a period of great art and music.
With the losses of Ginsberg, Leary, and now Burroughs, a whole model of "underground"--progressive art and science--has been cut from us. Never to be reborn. I feel that most of our greatest thinkers are gone, and their ideals can never be truly acheived, now.

MCvdWIV

Try as I might I could not grok what WSB was doing when I tried to read his work. And then a chance happening when an enlightened friend played the Giorno Poetry Sysytems LP containing WSB reading his Dinosaurs routine. When I heard that voice, its inflection injecting meaning into the text, I got it. Ever since that experience I have been hooked on WSB's writings and recordings. His prose is groundbreaking and his voice is music. Long live the art of WSB.

Although it seemed he would live forever, we knew he could not.
Then why this feeling of shock and sudden loss?
Is it all the icons we have lost these last couple of years?
Leary? Ginsberg? Now Burroughs.

If there is a Heaven I'm sure he is there, if only because he filed the definitive reports from Hell years ago.

I'm convinced I would be a very different person had he never lived & written.

No words: The wraithlike spectre of his person and prose form the pattern of my personality like the pinstripes of his suit.

--CW

This world is a better place because of the works of this great man. I am just just happy that he was with us for as long as he was.

The work and writings of WSB confronted and challenged my previously-held narrow-world view when I first started to read him as a Post-grad political science student. His surreal and subversive books opened up a new way of thinking for me, encouraging me to question all that is conservative, all that seeks to repress creativity and imagination , and all that seeks to maintain and abuse power. It is a bit of a shock to learn of his death, although it is not really a surprise, given his age and his long life of battling drugs. I always thought of him as being an almost immortal, wizened wizard, who was able to endure the most ravaging excesses. But, death must come to all, as it must, and it finally has caught up to "Unca Bill" as I liked to refer to him. While I had no real desire to replicate or imitate his life - shooting your wife and heroin addiction holds no great appeal for me - just reading his books and listening to his CDs - with that awesome, low, gravelly voice - gave me an insight into another world, expanding my conscioussness, "changing my head", freaking me out.
Vale, Unca Bill, your inspiration will live on.

BACK IN THE 60'S I discovered William Burroughs along with Ginsberg and Keroauc and became a fan of them all. I found the article on the front page of AOL where it told of Williams untimely or better yet, unfortunate death. My interest developed further due to my brothers friendship with Bill thus creating a closer link. Recently I was fortunate enough to have received a personally autographed copy of Junkie as a get well gift from Bill which my dear brother got for me upon his last visit with Bill in June. My heart is saddend at Bills death and know he will be greatly missed yet loved by many for as long as humanity exists.
Thank you for allowing me to sign this book and state my praise....I Miss You Bill.....

William S. Burroughs was truly a literary giant whose influence will be felt for generations to come. The cutup method that Burroughs developed with Brion Gysin has provided many artists a new objective through which to develop their literary perspective. The first cutup I ever read of his from The Third Mind blew me away...I'm sure that many participating in this tribute feel the same way about the sum of his writing. He had so much courage, and it was this fearlessness that made his art shine in a world of homogenized, pop-culture conformity.

To help develop the use of the cutup method and electronic text randomization, cybeRhyme, the literature section of Switch Magazine in Montreal (http://www.switchmag.com/rhyme/, houses the realitymachine cutup machine, developed by Eric Nyberg of Carnegie Mellon University. We hope that writers and fans of Burroughs' work will check out our experimental cutup section and use it.

Thank you again, William S. Burroughs. Rest in Peace.

Russell Harrison
Editor, cybeRhyme
Switch Magazine
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
http://www.switchmag.com/rhyme/

I first saw bill burroughs at the 'Final Solution' academy at Heaven, London in 1983. the tired old man mounts the steps to the podium clutching his plastic shopping bag of notes. Clears his croaky throat and at once silences a hall full of punks and psycho trash with random snippets of his writing. No one person has changed my life as much as him. Bon voyage WSB.

Thank you for the opportunity to say goodbye to WSB. I found this page in a random search of burroughs related material and it seems I've found the right place. There is a sense of loss but little sorrow in the pasing of WSB; he gave us more years and more wisdom than we could have hoped. we remember Bill with a smile washed with tears. To all the johnsons everywhere: mind your own business and let your business be that of the mind.

As he had once said, he was possessed by demons from the day he killed Joan. He must have exorcised them by now.

I wrote one thing before i heard the news from the room next door;

"One can only exist below what is known".

My friend Varna brought me a copy of Naked Lunch in the summer of 1965. "wildest thing since Candy -man just read the page 90 rim job". It was wild, but,unlike Varna I turned back to page one and the way I viewed literature was forever changed for the better. I'm a big tough guy but the news brought a tear to my eye. We're going to miss you Will.

He wrote the only book that ever made me cry (Western Lands). I got to the end and lost it. I've been somewhat afraid to pick it up again, although none of the other books have had a similar effect.

Goodbye, Bill

Thank you, from the fifteen-year-old boy who read your books all those years ago. Thank you from the people I have become since then, and for all the ways in which you have changed my life.

And thank you, above all, for telling the truth. You were a light to the world in your generation, and may there be a seat of honour for you in the world that is to come.

Thank you, and farewell.

I heard the news of Bill's passing while on a music video shoot, and although we had to get on with the job somehow we ended up with probably more gun and drug references than will be allowed on kiddy hour music television. I had just re-read the Ted Egan bio, closing the book on Friday ...

Adios to you who taught me the meaning of the word maricon I went to a halloween party as yr dead wife the final jolt that anyone will ever recieve from you is simply yr peaceful passing which will shock and hurt the people that your writing meant so much to i guess that i am left to yr voice on the keroac tribute cd talking about the old west...adios

The first book of William Burroughs I read was Junky. I wasn't familiar with his work. The only thing that I saw was Naked Lunch. A friend of mine and I, who is no longer here today, got high and went to an "arty" theatre and thought we were cool for seeing this surreal experience of William Burroughs. I could'nt follow the picture but I had an enjoyable time and was inspired to follow up on his work. I read Junky and fell in love with his words, his use of language and the fact that he was able to be a part of my life along with Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg. It is a shame that we all grow old and die. But with men like Burroughs and countless others, inspiration will continue to breed and fester into the minds of those looking. Thank You Mr. Burroughs.

Well; Bill Burroughs, Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg and many others in this game, are gone . I have a special place for Bill Burroughs' writing and his wild - chance, gifted, dramatic and sometimes magical-tragical life of lives. He damm well took life and lived it, every word was paid for with sweat; I salute this fine "advanced scout". The english phase "a one off" certainly applies here. There ain't never gonna be another you - Bill.
Lets make sure the writing and the - high cirrus cloud vapour trails - left by Bill and all these so called "beats" are not snuffed out by the techno - bioverbal engineers who wait in anticipation to tell us , just exactly what the hell so and so meant! The gift has been left by a tree, in a deserted spot, somewhere in a place someone called the "Western Lands". Perhaps some lost soul will pick up this gift and understand its value, I have no doubt they will. Thanks to James G. and all those who I never knew, for all the help and dedication. Jake

For some reason, I thought that junk would somewoh preseve your tissue, make you plastic and forever. Didn't you feel that way at one time? But perhaps it just made you look older sooner. Hell, seeing your picture, you looked more like 150, than 83. But now you don't look like anything, I guess. Just a mound of dirt, or is it an urn of ashes? Either way, you saw a hell of a lot, and you could not have left your body without a great deal of wieght, experiance, emotion. I hope you've found your jungle paradise with young native boys masturbating languidly under the trees and enough Yage to last eternity. Maybe where you are you won't have to deal with finding anymore cures. Anyway, thank you for your inspiration, and for your books, and for being a notorious fag before sitcom dike's were "in". May you rest in peace, and may your spirit continue to make young men cum and twist in thier Naked Lunch dreams.

I'm real happy I got to see WSB enjoy an hommage show I put together for him in Montreal 1989. Possibly, Huncke and Wsb saw each other there for the last time too. I can't begin to fathom the influence he's had upon me. I had a vivid dream about him just last week. I would like to thank Ira Silverberg for making it possible for me to meet the man back in '84.

"We never know how much we learn from those who never return" - Burroughs

I met Bill when he started shooting at the gun club where I was president. Our friendship of some 15 years grew out of our common love of guns and shooting, as well as literature and experiences in Africa and Europe. He was what one would call a gentleman of the old school, and was unfailingly gracious and free with his time. I could call, then drop by to visit at practically any time, and was always made to feel welcome. I think I became a part of a sort of extended family of people who loved him. His death takes from us all a marvelously powerful mind, and leaves a hole in our lives.

First Huncke, then Ginsberg, now Burroughs. Huncke never got too far off the streets despite a literary carrer that, until his death, many of us never knew about. Ginsberg, deservedly, entered the American literary pantheon despite a life's work that wouldn't play too well in Greater Utah, USA. Burroughs never really got the respect of those who make the survey-course syllabi, but at least he got the Nike ad, along with all the dubious perks that come with being a Living American Countercultural Icon. I wonder if he enjoyed the irony.

But hey, who cares about that? He was brilliant. He was a bastard at times. He wormed his way into my skull as few writers ever have, After getting over the shock of recognition, I haven't always been happy about that, but I have always been grateful. The real visionaries are usually the ones who piss us off a little bit.

So, as Giorno (?) said: you've got to burn to shine. And as Huncke said, on first meeting Burroughs: man, this guy is heat.

I was introduced to Bill a few years ago through my father. I was ten then, and had never heard of him before then. We visited him a few times after that, but not very often. This past year tho', I saw him about once a week, when we'd go shooting out at our friend Fred Aldrich's. Occasionally, he'd shoot up some shirts and sign them, but most of the time, we'd just shoot targets and metal spinners. He was a good shot even though he was old and quite frail, while I'm don't aim very well even tho' I'm pretty young. I never read any of his books, but I read a couple pages of My Education, and the first chapter of Ghost of a Chance. He was a good man and a genius. After we shot a few rounds, we'd go inside and have drinks and a snack or two, and I'd sit and listen while everyone else would discuss and debate the problems of the world. I saw him just last Tuesday in realitivly good health and condition. We went out and shot some then went inside and he signed the Bullet Hole shirt I was wearing. We were supposed to go shooting again on Wednesday, but I guess that's not going to happen now.

Farewell, Bill- you will be missed, especially by us who knew him well.

william s. burroughs was an individual who, through his writing, allowed me to begin to really think for myself and recognize whole new worlds which existed beyond my realm of knowledge. over the past 8 or 9 years, burroughs' writing has made me laugh, think, brood, and cry; his death is that of the first major iconic figure in my life, which is difficult in all rights. it is the passing of an age, the closing of a time.

when i met allen ginsberg a few years ago, the one question i wanted to ask him was simply 'what is burroughs like?' his response was a twenty-minute long dissertation on the mysterious man we've come to know through books such as queer, junky, and naked lunch. it seemed to me then, at the age of 13, that ginsberg, though probably closer to burroughs than anyone else through the past 30 or 40 years, was as eluded by the enigma of burroughs as any of us common readers. that only led me to be more intrigued by burroughs.

i thank burroughs for what he provided me with, and what i hope he will provide my children with when they read his books. i am only sorry that i was never able to meet the man.

kate peterson.

I first read Naked Lunch as a profoundly closted teenager. I guess it was an illicit thrill. Now, that I'm out and proud, I realise the old man has taught me the importance of being queeeerrr....the importance of being yourself. The importance of experimentation and discovery.

His immortality will spring from his role as the diseased and dangerous antithesis of the safe Doris Day and apple pie kitsch-culture of Ike’s disinfected 50s America.

But for queers, he should serve as a role model of untameable individuality which remained rampant despite the prevelance of a deadening culture of clones.

Eros and Thanatos. Sex and Death.

Bill, I trust your reincarnation will be an interesting one (and hopefully less Kafakaesque than the last).

Farvel, El Hombre Invisible.

..A circle of thirteen apes clothed in the kind of attire seen in nineteen twenties America. Ragged bowler hats and canes, bow ties now faded and shabby with the accumulated years of wear and tear, old beat ducktailed tuxedos pockmarked with cigarette burnt holes, pockets stuffed with browning bananas and bottles of cheap bourbon whiskey.
The warm flicker on the orange haired and wisened faces of these ancient primates was not caused by the dance of hot flames but an antique Atari 2600 game console which rested on an iron cylinder decorated with scatterings of rich red rust. One of the apes, a head taller in stature than the other twelve, was quietly manovering the joystick while his companions looked on, all watching the screen with ageless, chilled azure blue eyes.....

To quote the most immortal of bards,

"I have blown a hole in time with a firecracker. Let others step through...A few may get through the gate in time. Like Spain, I am bound to the past""

Cities of the Red Night

I'm too young to know so much about william burroughs.
I know him from his work with laurie anderson, and because he was a friend of allen ginsbergh.
but I'm really sad that he is gone.
I will miss him.
I'm really shocked because the best are away now.
we have to go to the next millenium without them.
I feel a deep sadness.

matthias

Let he who lived the most die at last.
Thanks Bill...

Read the man's works! There is no greater eulogy.

'Word begets Image and Image is Virus.'

Did Burroughs affect me?

I once wrote a tune called 'Uncle Bill' while playing bass in a band named 'Junk Sick Dawn' and we took it on the road from Seattle to San Diego.

It was in Seattle that we saw the streets lined with used condoms and orange peels.

The time was 3AM.

I regret that I could never play that song for Burroughs...

'word falling, photo falling'

...now I'll shut-up and read all his stuff again.

"When I become death, death is the seed
from which I grow"

"Death needs time for what it kills to
grow in"

"Nobody owns life, but anyone who can
lift a frying pan owns death"

Jeff Isbell

When I first started to get into W.S.B., it didn't eat me up.
I was not yet psychologically adicted. My mind was still intact.
After Naked Lunch, though, everything changed... slowly
and surely my senses soon ceased to exist and everything
around me was pure high emotion. Everything spun in a web
of disillusionment, and my mind worked like the mirror
of a metamorphosized cockroach. I truly wish the same for all,
to live and breathe in the rich scent of literature... this
being the highest honour of all, and the loss of one of my
patron saints is a huge dent in the body of my mind and
the depth of my heart. I hope
and pray that his literature will remain immortal, as his
soul will soar high in all our minds forever and ever and
ever.
~Z

If he were here, he would kill us all.
If I could, I would cry.
I hope he has gone to a much better place, but I doubt it very highly.