Death: 2nd August 1997Location: Bellefontaine Cemetery, St. Louis, Missouri, United States
Cause of death: Heart Attack
Photo taken by: christina rutz
Buy books by William S. Burroughs
American writer and primary figure of the Beat Generation who wrote eighteen novels and novellas, six collections of short stories and four collections of essays. He also collaborated on projects and recordings with numerous performers and musicians, and made many appearances in films. In 1943, while living in New York City, he befriended Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac, and out of their mutual influence grew the foundation of the Beat Generation.
Much of Burroughs's work is semi-autobiographical, primarily drawn from his experiences as a heroin addict. Burroughs accidentally killed his second wife, Joan Vollmer, in 1951 in Mexico City with a pistol during a drunken "William Tell" game; he was consequently convicted of manslaughter.
Burroughs found success with his confessional first novel, Junky (1953), but he is perhaps best known for his third novel Naked Lunch (1959), a highly controversial work that was the subject of a court case after it was challenged as being in violation of the U.S. sodomy laws. Burroughs had one child, William S. Burroughs, Jr., who was also a writer.
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