Squatting on old bones and excrement and rusty iron, in a white blaze of heat, a panorama of naked idiots stretches to the horizon.  Complete silence–their speech centers are destroyed–except for the crackle of sparks and the popping of singed flesh as they apply electrodes up and down the spine.  White smoke of burning flesh hangs in the motionless air.  A group of children have tied an idiot to a post with barbed wire and built a fire between his legs and stand watching with bestial curiosity as the flames lick his thighs.  His flesh jerks in the fire with insect agony.

–Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs

why, i ask, is this book not taught in high school???  if you’ve ever wanted to try heroin, morphine, etc., read this book and you will want to vomit and go into convulsions each time you think about injecting anything into yourself. 

it’s an incredible book, if you haven’t read it before.  a favorite of most readers is the section on the talking asshole.  i think it’s hilarious, but there are so many pieces in the book that are so great that i don’t think i could pick one as my favorite. 

you don’t just learn about the nightmare it is to be a junkie.  you also learn interesting facts, such as the phenomena of bang-utot.  as reported in the Saturday Evening Post in the article “The Men With Deadly Dreams,” by Nils P. Larsen M.D., december 3, 1955, people have been found lying dead in their beds.  they were perfectly healthy and had no signs of murder, etc.  they believe they had a nightmare that was so terrifying and real that it physically killed them.

also, did you know that jungle rats are subject to die if confronted suddenly with a hopeless situation?

During his first severe infection the boiling thermometer flashed a quicksilver bullet into the nurse’s brain and she fell dead with a mangled scream.

–Naked Lunch