It was Paul Maher’s Kerouac biography – or the Ann Charter one – or maybe even Kerouac’s On The Road that first introduced me to William S. Burroughs. Burroughs was one of the key figures of the Beat Generation which Kerouac served (quite reluctantly) as chairman of the board. Like Ginserg, Kerouac, Huncke, and a few others, Burroughs lived, saw, conquered, observed and wrote. His Queer novel was so unprecedented and scandalous at the time it was written (1951-53), that he could not find anyone willing to publish it. Finally, in 1985 Viking Press released Queer to rave reactions and respectable reviews…(cont).
