William Burroughs, The Western Lands

Chad Weidner

Ed. by Christopher Hugh Gair, University of Glasgow
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.4: American (US) Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary, 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Sofia Ahlberg (Uppsala University), Patrick Chura (University of Akron), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Christopher Hugh Gair (University of Glasgow), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Kerry Myler (Birmingham Newman University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1987

Places

United States (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

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The Western Lands

was published by Viking Press in 1987. It is the final book of a late Burroughs trilogy that began with

Cities of the Red Night

(1981) and

The Place of Dead Roads

(1983) and is a fitting conclusion to it in terms of scope and vision. Different from

Cities of the Red Night

and

Place of Dead Roads

, the book recognizes the impossibility of really escaping our broken condition unless we radically reimagine ourselves. Norman Mailer’s

The Book of the Dead

was a source of inspiration for the book, and the content of

The Western Lands

is bold and wide-ranging. The author handles a number of issues throughout the narrative. Fragments are autobiographical, and show the aging writer’s anxieties about his own mortality. Burroughs also contemplates social and ecological…

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1889 words

Citation: Weidner, Chad. "The Western Lands". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 31 August 2011 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=8129, accessed 19 April 2024.]

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