Rub Out the Words: Letters 1959-1974

William Burroughs’ life was often as extreme as his prose. This second volume of his letters documents the time after the notorious publication of Naked Lunch in 1959, as he drifted away from the Beats and on towards new experiences in Europe and North Africa.

These letters cover the activities of Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, and Jack Kerouac in the years that gave birth to the Beat Generation. Written mostly to Ginsberg or Kerouac, the letters provide a rare glimpse into Burroughs’s psyche, revealing his struggle with drug addiction, his confusion over his sexual identity, and his search for a form fluid enough to mirror his mind and art.