He was a central figure of the Beat Generation whose influence extended beyond literature to rock music and visual arts. He lived all over the global but spent his last years in Lawrence, Kansas — he liked the quiet there and the opportunity to fish and hunt.
William S. Burroughs was born 100 years ago today. His books included “Naked Lunch.” He was a member of the Beat Generation, writers who rose to prominence in the 1950s, for the most part, and had a huge influence questioning society’s standards and traditions.
Burroughs was openly gay, and wrestled with heroin addiction much of his life. He lived all over the world, but spent his last years in Lawrence, Kan., where we go next. Frank Morris, of member station KCUR, reports on his odd but enduring place in a Midwestern city.
FRANK MORRIS, BYLINE: Here in Lawrence, Kan., you can still get a haircut from William Burroughs’ barber.
MARTY OLSON: My name’s Marty Olson, and I cut William’s hair for 13 years. And I cooked dinner for him a few times, and went to a few parties over at this house.
MORRIS: Can I get William Burroughs’ haircut?
OLSON: Certainly. You want one like him?
MORRIS: Burroughs moved to Lawrence in 1981.
JAMES GRAUERHOLZ: He needed to get out of New York – away from the fame, the media, the thrill-seekers, the, you know…
MORRIS: The heroin. James Grauerholz became, briefly, Burroughs’ lover, then his agent and the man who brought him to Lawrence.
GRAUERHOLZ: I lured him, but there’s something called the genius loci, which means the spirit of a place, and he, within a year or two, became the spirit of the place.
MORRIS: Right after he moved, Burroughs wrote this song for a local punk band, The Mortal Micronotz.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG)
MORRIS: And collaborated with other local artists, including Phillip Heying, a photographer who was a freshman at the University of Kansas when Burroughs came to town.
PHILLIP HEYING: On the one hand, it was very normal. Like, it was just this guy I knew that was kind of eccentric. In other ways, it was like all of a sudden having a volcano erupt in your backyard.
(SOUNDBITE OF GUNFIRE)
MORRIS: That’s Burroughs on YouTube, blasting Ralph Steadman’s portrait of William Shakespeare. The writer also shot paint cans, creating hundreds of visual art pieces out of their splattered remains, and Steadman was hardly the only famous visitor. Allen Ginsberg, Timothy Leary, Patti Smith and many others dropped by his small bungalow.