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Η Βίβλος των αααναπνοών
Στο βιβλίο αυτό ο Μπάρροουζ ασχολείται με τον έλεγχο της Γλώσσας φτάνοντας στο σημείο να αμφισβητήσει την κεντρική εξουσία του ίδιου του Λόγου, ένα πρόβλημα που τον είχε απασχολήσει και παλαιότερα μέσα στις σελίδες της "Ηλεκτρονικής Επανάστασης". Κι ενώ εκείνο ήταν μια μελέτη πάνω στις σύγχρονες επαναστατικές τακτικές και στα νέα "τεχνολογικά" όπλα (τη μαγνητοταινία), τούτο εδώ είναι ένα παράξενα συναρπαστικό εικονογραφημένο βιβλίο, φτιαγμένο όχι πάνω στα πρότυπα των παραδοσιακών εικονογραφημένων βιβλίων αλλά ένα βιβλίο όπου οι εικόνες συμπληρώνουν με ακρίβεια το κείμενο εκεί που οι λέξεις από μόνες τους δεν είναι πια σε θέση να το καταφέρουν.
72 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1975
1 person is currently reading
140 people want to read
About the author
William S. Burroughs
449 books7,018 followersWilliam Seward Burroughs II, (also known by his pen name William Lee) was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, painter, and spoken word performer.
A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author, he is considered to be "one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th century".
His influence is considered to have affected a range of popular culture as well as literature. Burroughs wrote 18 novels and novellas, six collections of short stories and four collections of essays.
Five books have been published of his interviews and correspondences. He also collaborated on projects and recordings with numerous performers and musicians, and made many appearances in films.
He was born to a wealthy family in St. Louis, Missouri, grandson of the inventor and founder of the Burroughs Corporation, William Seward Burroughs I, and nephew of public relations manager Ivy Lee. Burroughs began writing essays and journals in early adolescence. He left home in 1932 to attend Harvard University, studied English, and anthropology as a postgraduate, and later attended medical school in Vienna. After being turned down by the Office of Strategic Services and U.S. Navy in 1942 to serve in World War II, he dropped out and became afflicted with the drug addiction that affected him for the rest of his life, while working a variety of jobs. In 1943 while living in New York City, he befriended Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac, the mutually influential foundation of what became the countercultural movement of the Beat Generation.
Much of Burroughs's work is semi-autobiographical, primarily drawn from his experiences as a heroin addict, as he lived throughout Mexico City, London, Paris, Berlin, the South American Amazon and Tangier in Morocco. Finding success with his confessional first novel, Junkie (1953), Burroughs is perhaps best known for his third novel Naked Lunch (1959), a controversy-fraught work that underwent a court case under the U.S. sodomy laws. With Brion Gysin, he also popularized the literary cut-up technique in works such as The Nova Trilogy (1961–64). In 1983, Burroughs was elected to the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, and in 1984 was awarded the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by France. Jack Kerouac called Burroughs the "greatest satirical writer since Jonathan Swift", a reputation he owes to his "lifelong subversion" of the moral, political and economic systems of modern American society, articulated in often darkly humorous sardonicism. J. G. Ballard considered Burroughs to be "the most important writer to emerge since the Second World War", while Norman Mailer declared him "the only American writer who may be conceivably possessed by genius".
Burroughs had one child, William Seward Burroughs III (1947-1981), with his second wife Joan Vollmer. Vollmer died in 1951 in Mexico City. Burroughs was convicted of manslaughter in Vollmer's death, an event that deeply permeated all of his writings. Burroughs died at his home in Lawrence, Kansas, after suffering a heart attack in 1997.
A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author, he is considered to be "one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th century".
His influence is considered to have affected a range of popular culture as well as literature. Burroughs wrote 18 novels and novellas, six collections of short stories and four collections of essays.
Five books have been published of his interviews and correspondences. He also collaborated on projects and recordings with numerous performers and musicians, and made many appearances in films.
He was born to a wealthy family in St. Louis, Missouri, grandson of the inventor and founder of the Burroughs Corporation, William Seward Burroughs I, and nephew of public relations manager Ivy Lee. Burroughs began writing essays and journals in early adolescence. He left home in 1932 to attend Harvard University, studied English, and anthropology as a postgraduate, and later attended medical school in Vienna. After being turned down by the Office of Strategic Services and U.S. Navy in 1942 to serve in World War II, he dropped out and became afflicted with the drug addiction that affected him for the rest of his life, while working a variety of jobs. In 1943 while living in New York City, he befriended Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac, the mutually influential foundation of what became the countercultural movement of the Beat Generation.
Much of Burroughs's work is semi-autobiographical, primarily drawn from his experiences as a heroin addict, as he lived throughout Mexico City, London, Paris, Berlin, the South American Amazon and Tangier in Morocco. Finding success with his confessional first novel, Junkie (1953), Burroughs is perhaps best known for his third novel Naked Lunch (1959), a controversy-fraught work that underwent a court case under the U.S. sodomy laws. With Brion Gysin, he also popularized the literary cut-up technique in works such as The Nova Trilogy (1961–64). In 1983, Burroughs was elected to the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, and in 1984 was awarded the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by France. Jack Kerouac called Burroughs the "greatest satirical writer since Jonathan Swift", a reputation he owes to his "lifelong subversion" of the moral, political and economic systems of modern American society, articulated in often darkly humorous sardonicism. J. G. Ballard considered Burroughs to be "the most important writer to emerge since the Second World War", while Norman Mailer declared him "the only American writer who may be conceivably possessed by genius".
Burroughs had one child, William Seward Burroughs III (1947-1981), with his second wife Joan Vollmer. Vollmer died in 1951 in Mexico City. Burroughs was convicted of manslaughter in Vollmer's death, an event that deeply permeated all of his writings. Burroughs died at his home in Lawrence, Kansas, after suffering a heart attack in 1997.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
March 6, 2008
The illustrations push this to a new level. Burroughs explores Egyptian hieroglyphics, Hassan i Sabbah, The Curse of King Tut, etc. It all ties together: visionary, magikal (&, yes, my spelling is deliberate). It's as if Burroughs achieved a highly disciplined penetrating vision & locked it in place. Gale's images are just as great IF NOT BETTER. The 2 together are amazing.
November 11, 2012
στην ραφή ανάμεσα παρατηρείς...
άνθρωπος : το ζώο που συγκρατεί τον χρόνο..
εκεί που δεν φτάνουν οι λέξεις συμπληρώνουν οι εικόνες και τα νοήματα.
και αν τίποτα δεν έχει πραγματικά ουσία τότε... απόλαυσε το με μια αααααναπνοη!
άνθρωπος : το ζώο που συγκρατεί τον χρόνο..
εκεί που δεν φτάνουν οι λέξεις συμπληρώνουν οι εικόνες και τα νοήματα.
και αν τίποτα δεν έχει πραγματικά ουσία τότε... απόλαυσε το με μια αααααναπνοη!
May 1, 2020
It's hard to understand if Burrough's hieroglyphic viruses want to lock you inside a tetrahedronic manifold or inside Rudkhan Castle, but following Gale's psychogeographic interpretations I'd guess those are really the only two options. Absorptive dementia is just a dimension of what words are to the One of Two points down connected to Three points up, a vehicle of aposymbiotic relationship with the reader.
February 4, 2008
Edit: HOLY JESUS. If you want to buy this book (and I'm not sure why) it's going to run you AT LEAST 130$. FUCKING WHY. Seriously. Amazon it. One copy costs over 700$. What...
Honestly, I don't know what (if anything) the author was trying to get at with this. To say it is strange and cryptic is an understatement. The pictures were mildly horrifying. The plot was nonexistent. It's uh.. nonlinear. To say the least. It's really useless to try to explain, you kind of just have to see it for yourself. But don't read it in public, unless you want people to think you're a pervert (there are pictures of "eejack phalluses" as the author calls them, all over the place).
In conclusion: I don't know.
Also, why are there only two goodreads reviews of this? My crappy school library has it, it can't be that obscure.
Oh yeah, and the style of the pictures reminded me of less funny David Shrigley drawings.
Honestly, I don't know what (if anything) the author was trying to get at with this. To say it is strange and cryptic is an understatement. The pictures were mildly horrifying. The plot was nonexistent. It's uh.. nonlinear. To say the least. It's really useless to try to explain, you kind of just have to see it for yourself. But don't read it in public, unless you want people to think you're a pervert (there are pictures of "eejack phalluses" as the author calls them, all over the place).
In conclusion: I don't know.
Also, why are there only two goodreads reviews of this? My crappy school library has it, it can't be that obscure.
Oh yeah, and the style of the pictures reminded me of less funny David Shrigley drawings.
March 24, 2019
Too much Burroughs, too fucking weird.
Read
June 29, 2025this is a very intriguing text, and thus i’m not quite sure how to rate it, but i did really enjoy it. i think i ought to read another text by burroughs and maybe some texts on hieroglyphs and return to this one again. also the illustrations were incredible.
August 2, 2020
I liked the drawings.
February 16, 2023
Hassan I Sabbah musings and the text about writing before speech. Foundational Burroughs stuff and thrilled to finally own a copy. 17 year old me thinks I need to RIP the shroud from my eyes.
October 20, 2023
“Any variation of sets and pictures can be used . . . harvest moon over the corn shucks and pumpkins, boy with teeth bare as he jacks off, howling wolf, owl in a tree.
WHOOOOO
WHOOOO
WHOOO”
WHOOOOO
WHOOOO
WHOOO”
August 25, 2016
Words.
a virus that inflects the mind, redesign it, reshape it, and becomes it infesting parasitic entity.
sounds Bizarre? You're Reading Burroughs. what else could you expect?
a sombre read? a light read?
Nope.
you get instead, Burroughs fascination with the powers of words, the Persian Assassins of yore, and their coded, long forgotten, methodical, if esoteric , methods of brain washing & conducting Missions using simple words that, once heard, triggers a reaction that leads the assassin to commit his mission on the spot.
aside from this subject, the erotic grotesque inner illustrations, the book is only worth the read, if you're an already a devotee of Burroughs.
If Not. well....*Salam/Kill*
a virus that inflects the mind, redesign it, reshape it, and becomes it infesting parasitic entity.
sounds Bizarre? You're Reading Burroughs. what else could you expect?
a sombre read? a light read?
Nope.
you get instead, Burroughs fascination with the powers of words, the Persian Assassins of yore, and their coded, long forgotten, methodical, if esoteric , methods of brain washing & conducting Missions using simple words that, once heard, triggers a reaction that leads the assassin to commit his mission on the spot.
aside from this subject, the erotic grotesque inner illustrations, the book is only worth the read, if you're an already a devotee of Burroughs.
If Not. well....*Salam/Kill*
January 27, 2012
This book is so stark that it is a bit difficult to take. However, it is interesting to see one of Burroughs' alternative science ideas being explored.
The man believed in the significance of serendipity.
The man believed in the significance of serendipity.
August 6, 2011
Very rare, mine is autographed by the man himself. Wish they would reprint this one.
November 24, 2011
This book is important. A family is only as good as the trouble it causes.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews