Queer (novel)
First edition
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| Author | William S. Burroughs |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Viking Press |
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Publication date
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November 1985 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| ISBN | |
| OCLC | 12050392 |
| 813/.54 19 | |
| LC Class | PS3552.U75 Q8 1985 |
| Preceded by | Junkie |
| Followed by | Minutes to Go (1960) with Sinclair Beiles, Gregory Corso, and Brion Gysin |
Queer is an early short novel (written between 1951 and 1953, published in 1985) by William S. Burroughs. It is partially a sequel to his earlier novel, Junkie, which ends with the stated ambition of finding a drug called Yage. Queer, although not devoted to that quest, does include a trip to South America looking for the substance.
The novel begins with the introduction of "Lee," who recounts his life in Mexico City among an American expatriate college students and bar owners surviving on part-time jobs and GI Bill benefits. The novel is written in the third-person and Burroughs commented in the "Introduction" published in 1985, that it represents him off heroin, whereas in Junkie, his narrator was psychologically "protected" by his addiction. Lee is self-conscious, insecure, and driven to pursue a young man named Allerton, who is based on Adelbert Lewis Marker (1930-1998), a recently discharged American Navy serviceman from Jacksonville, Florida who befriended Burroughs in Mexico City.
Queer was originally written as an extension of Junkie, which had been judged too short and uninteresting for publication. Burroughs lost interest in the manuscript, and chose not to return to it even after Junkie was accepted. It was doubtful whether much of the content could be published in the USA at that time, since the heavy homosexual content and theme could be held as obscene. Jack Kerouac admired the work and thought it would appeal to "east coast homosexual literary critics". It was eventually published in 1985 with a new Introduction, when Burroughs's literary agent Andrew Wylie secured him a lucrative publishing contract for future novels with Viking. Reportedly, he had not read the manuscript in thirty years because of the emotional trauma it caused him. Much of it was composed while Burroughs was awaiting trial for the accidental homicide of his common-law wife Joan Vollmer.
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