Rating: 
Summary: Carbonation belching from below the waist
Review: I would love to pour on and on about Mr. Burroughs and this book. I want to spew forth thoughtful, intelligent, and academic critiques of Naked Lunch. I would love to dwell on the symbolism and the genius present in the text and analize it, break it apart, and teach those who cannot see, how to. Moreso, I would love to explain that it is more than a drug induced, hypnotic, homo-erotic, chronical of hell........ but, sadly, I can not. Following the point, structure, and overall theme of the book, I think it would destroy the very meaning the book holds by dissecting it, praising it, offering my mediocre take on Mr. Burroughs masterpiece. Such works can not be explained. They create a thought, an idea, a feeling within the reader that can not be expressed, and therein lies the genius. Naked Lunch has left me awestruck, and examining life on a whole different level. I feel dirty, exhilerated, perverted, emaciated, withdrawn, euphoric, and numb after reading it. I feel, this was Burroughs intent.
Rating: 
Summary: Surreality is cool, but what the heck is this book about?!?!
Review: I searched far and wide on the net and other places to find out what exactly is the PLOT of this book. You all remember plot, right? Novels usually have plots. I keep reading that it's this hallucinogenic, psychedelic, quasi-sci-fi weirdo drug novel about drug-addiction, and an allegorical battle between Good and Evil; Individualistic (as well as drug-addicted) "good-guys" fighting uniformist, totalitarian, evil "bad guys." Reading this, I very vaguely found something like that. But this book seems to be an almost random splatter of grammar-lacking wording and nonsensical statements. There's no true form. Burroughs will be talking about something, and just when you think you might've caught on to what the heck is going on, it gets all freaky and nasty and random and--BLAH! The sex scenes are vulgar--I mean a beyond-hardcore pornographer on acid would throw up reading this stuff--and not only mindbendingly, gratuitously vulgar, but constant! There's always mentionings of "cunts" and "cocks" and "sperm" and "fags" and crap! Is that stuff really necessary? The stuff is chemically-induced scribblings, based on nightmarish drug hallucination. That would be cool if he added order and storyline to the thing! Where are the fights between Good and Evil? Where's the fight for Individuality against conformist totalitarianism? Heck, where is the STORY? Where's the order? The book's sloppy, vulgar, random, and a sickening letdown! All these people giving such rave reviews for this weird acid pulp made to rot, I would probably appreciate this "novel" a bit more if someone explained it to me! I prefer storylines in my books. I like surreality and weirdness in my fiction, but from now on I'll consult the likes of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. and Franz Kafka for that kind of fiction rather than Mr. Burroughs.
Rating:
Summary: As always, the lunch is naked.
Review: First-time exposure to "Naked Lunch" produces two reactions: total confusion, or total devotion. People either love it or hate it: they either see a wretched mess of sex and violence, or they see a whole 'nother universe waiting to suck them in, beat them up, and take their lunch money. Which is all any decent book should offer -- a glimpse of something you can't have "out here with the rest of the apes".Is there a plot? No -- not in the sense of a story where a challenge is overcome and we all go home happy (or fuming, depending on how our proclivities have been stroked or enraged). Burroughs himself says: "I am not an entertainer." He is not here to tell us something we already know (and certainly nothing as trite a mistakenly moralistic screed as "Don't Do Drugs"). He is here to show us the territory he walked when he was dying in his own flesh. And if we are honest, we know that we have seen a piece of that world as well. Burroughs lived in it for fifteen years. Presumably he has something to tell us about it. "'Naked Lunch' is a How-To book," Burroughs says in his "Atrophied Preface" (which, thanks to the book's mad logic, comes at the end). It's an instruction manual of sorts -- a way of tearing off veils and seeing things as they need to be seen. Human nature is scarcely pretty, concerned mostly with feeding hungers and satisfying exploitive urges without getting caught. The process may get a dressing-up, but we forget all too easily how there are frankly unscientific, illogical and downright bestial things pumping away messily inside all of us. (Doc Benway, call your office.) For anyone seriously interested in talking or thinking about the wretched state of human existence as it is now, the book's pretty much indispensible. You need this.
Rating: 
Summary: What the #%&**!! is this?
Review: I've read it twice. It doesn't get better the second time around. People seem to enjoy this book, almost as if they can understand what is going on. Besides how pointless this book is, there's the constant graphic sex scenes. Normally I don't mind that kind of stuff, but this is so explicit, I almost wanted to throw up at times...anyway, I'm just lettin you know what lies ahead. I definately don't recomend it. Proceed with caution.
Rating:
Summary: Out for Naked Lunch
Review: Naked Lunch is a buffet of all our bullshit for all us cannibals. The point is that we are sick passive addicts hosting nasty viruses we tout around as virtues or human qualities. First case in point: the emperor wears no clothes--found in reviews of Joyce (both Ulysses and the Wake) and of Kafka and used as a book title and for a number of other anti-intellectual tirades. The cliche is an infectious parasitical "meme" (check up on meme theory--stolen from Burroughs, or contracted)that keeps people replicating past events--keeping the truly human dead. Burroughs meant to show us the repetitive ugliness of ourselves--our shit--so we would stop digging in it and putting it out as something glamorous. The book is highly theory-dominated, with metaphysics, epistemological models, ideo-political constructs. The plot is of Bill Lee's heroin addiction, withdrawl, and his on-going treatment. But the addictions are also to violence, sadomasochism, medical power, authority, revolt against these, and most everything else. The novel is all allegorical. Inter-Zone comes from the latin for the in-between. Caught between space/time and death/X, few can escape from the vicious cycle. "Who scared us into time?" Burroughs asks. His answer is, "Words." "All love all lust all hate all pain is held in words." Naked Lunch should sicken us--the same as his apo-cure, since words, consciousness, and their products are the true illness. This book is a pharmakon: poison-cure. The disease: morality, idealism, romanticism--what you will,--Burroughs pronounces our civilization one vast hypocritical cancer, a malignant tumor, proliferating through idiocy, supporting atrocity, never advancing., forever regressing. The work should be read beside Rimbaud's Illuminations--specifically, Parade, Soir Historique, Villes I & II, Barbare, Aube D'Ivresse, Metropolitan, Nocturne Ordinaire,and L'Impossible from Une Saison en Enfer. The true junkie is the one unaware. Who is worse--those who think the book is too OUT THERE, or those who only see it as WAY OUT? "In and out in and out in and out in and out. Over and out." "The way IN is the way OUT."
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant. An outstanding work from an outstanding mind.
Review: Some people believe that this book is nothing but some old junky rambling incoherently. I believe these people have no vision, no understanding, no comprehension of how this book works. Naked Lunch is not a plot neatly cut with stereotype characters and appeal for the lowest common denomenator. Naked Lunch is an experience; a bold, powerful, mind shattering text. A person, however, must keep an open mind. To do otherwise is to cut the circulation of thought completely. Personally I think that Naked Lunch, when properly recieved, is a literary milestone... Read it yourself and draw your own conclusions.
Rating:
Summary: This is a book you can smell
Review: Beyond a doubt, Naked Lunch is the absolute funniest book I have ever read ... far more outrageous than HSTs "F&L in Las Vegas". Dr. Benway is a character for the ages. Of all of the heralded "Beat" generation writers, Kerouac is probably the most lauded. Keroac was cool -- a tragic hipster trying to find himself in the dawn of corporate growth, but Burroughs was (and still is) the perfect counterpoint to a "Leave-it-to-Beaver" America. Anyone who actually read this book and did not find it mesmerizing and hilarious were obviously in waaaaay over their heads (it's okay to admit your shortcomings), and should stick to King, Clancy or the latest from Danielle Steele. After all, people who still need to sound-out words when reading have no business picking up an actual piece of literature. Much like a non-swimmer diving into the deep end to impress the county cutie, that type will quickly find themselves in a lot of trouble, and will ususally come up with the standard excuses for why they didn't get the book. So you folks can keep reading about how our hero Sgt. Bloodspiller saved America from the evil Arab hoards, or how Ms. Frostypants finally found true love at the hands of the neighborhood plumber. But those who can actually taste the words of a well written book will be wee advised to sink their teeth into this one
Rating:
Summary: A fine piece of work, but not for everyone
Review: You can look at all of the reviews here and see 1-5 stars. That in it self, says something very impressive to me. Good art, in my opinion, evokes strong reactions. You either love it or hate it. If you only get a half assed reaction, then you've done a half assed job. Burroughs creates something completely different and amazing here, but not everyone's going to see it. Even if you like the book, you might not see it ... I'm not sure I have. But much like the work of artists like John Cage, Picasso, and David Lynch ... there's something bigger here.
Rating:
Summary: "That's not writing--that's typing"-Truman Capote to Kerouac
Review: Too bad you can't give a book "zero stars." This is the worst book ever. Burroughs attempts to offer up the complexity of a "Ulysses" or "Finnegan's Wake" with none of the talent or intellect. Unfortuanately, drugs don't make you deep, they make you incoherent. Absolute, chemically induced nonsense, like listening to someone slam on a piano keyboard for twelve hours and then tell you that it's not that they can't play, they're just interested in slamming on the keys. The big mystery is how this nonsense got published, but, after reading some of the reviews, I see that there are some people who seem to "get it". "Wow, man, dig it, it's like, so surreal..."
Rating:
Summary: Look At It As A Whole----- Hence a Naked Lunch.
Review: A lot of people say that Burroughs's writing doesn't make sense, and to be honest it doesn't ---- only in particular areas. When someone first reads Naked Lunch, they usually begin with a clear mind but soon get caught up in Burroughs's abstract rhetoric which, may seem like gobbledygook to the average layman. Relax, Burroughs does this for many reasons, especially as an effect to create emphasis on what was previously said. Generally, these "cut-ups," or gobbledygook, are assembled with many words already stated, but in several different arrangements. However, a lot of these cut-ups are developed extensively in other Burroughs novels (i.e. The Soft Machine), and is occasionally used in NL ---- what's used in NL is essentially a standardized Burroughs technique, very similar to the writings of Tristan Tzara and other surrealists. Although a lot of the writing was drug induced, it was not published in its original raw form ---- as some narrow minded readers would say. A lot of the book was revised and edited by people such as Allen Ginsberg (Howl) to Paul Bowles (The Sheltering Sky), who saw the book as revolutionary even in its greenly jumbled format. Several stories were extracted from this rough manuscript (entitled Word Horde) to make many of the 'Cut-up trilogies,' particularly The Ticket That Exploded, and Nova Express. Although these two novels may seem even more abstract than NL, they still sustain a general theme, which is clearly evident in The Naked Lunch. Nevertheless, Naked Lunch is the kind of book the reader has to view in its total perspective, therefore the flashy jargon and word play will be more understandable than when it was picked up. Give it a try, put it down, then step back and look at what's on the tip of your fork --- hence a naked lunch.
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