​Review of Queer by William S. Burroughs

Queer by William S. Burroughs is a novella that follows an expat, Lee, as he lives and parties in Mexico City in the late 1940s. Lee is an old queen who clamors over younger men, drinks to excess and begins to fall in love with a man named Allerton. Allerton however presents his sexuality vaguely, sometimes hanging around a woman named Mary, other times going out to bars with one of the vibrantly flamboyant gays where they attend gay clubs. Lee latches himself onto Allerton, nearly pleading him though thinly veiled stories of queer encounters to monologues about a mind control drug called Yage—supposed later on in the novella to be Ayahuasca. Eventually, Lee invites Allerton to his place after a long night out drinking where, after Allerton pukes, they have sex. After, Lee attaches himself more to Allerton, and in one overtly romantic appeal buys Allerton’s pawned off camera for 600 pesos. Though this action makes Allerton pull away from Lee because he doesn’t like being indebted to anyone. Allerton goes away for a stint and then upon his return, Lee pleads with him to join on his search and selling of Yage in South America. Allerton reluctantly joins him and they first take their time on outings, then eventually hear about a white man deep in the jungle that is doing chemistry on what Lee supposes to be Yage. After an arduous search, they find the man, but he is so skeptical of Lee that nothing comes of their search. Now, six months later as Lee goes around photographing people that don’t want to be photographed, he returns to Mexico City looking for Allerton only to find that five months before, Allerton left back to South America. And he hadn’t been heard since.
 
Burroughs does strikingly well in balancing a sharpness to his prose while also capturing the voicy-ness of Lee. Lee himself seems to be a parallel world version of Burroughs in which both lived in Mexico City, both had queer sexual encounters, and both were obsessed with occult/occult-like medicines. It may even be true to say that Lee’s character (what I read as a washed-out “queen” who desires the limelight but is relegated to the backstreets of Mexico) is Burroughs making digs at himself. When, for instance, Lee begins to make up a story, adding in bravado, and Allerton becomes so disinterested that he leaves, the narrative mocks him, noting how the bar itself was nearly empty. In effect, Lee is playing to an empty crowd—that is except for himself. In this way, Lee’s lust for Allerton may be more a need for a man who listens to him and not so much is in conversation with him. His self-obsession overrides Allerton’s own needs as a man who desires to be indiscrete and non-committal. Lee’s character is also questionable when he sees a group of teenage boys and begins lusting over them, adding to his predatory nature (in both taking advantage of Allerton and desiring to capitalize on a mind controlling drug). It’s hard for me to tell if this narrative of Lee (one I take as subtly mocking him) is Burroughs’s earnestness about his own self. I only need to point to Burroughs’s own obsession with the occult and Yage and his time in Mexico City to think that Queer’s narrative is his way of justifying himself. Whether self-aware or not, the ending lacked a cohesion that this type of narrative needed. It ends on a dream that is about Allerton, but is so separated from everything else that it felt disjointed and dissatisfying. While I may not fully understand why it ends that way, I have wondered why Burroughs doesn’t end it in a more inevitably. That is, after taking photos and asking around Mexico City and learning that Allerton isn’t there anymore, Lee should’ve gone around taking more photos and thinks he sees Allerton, only to realize it isn’t Allerton. But then begins hitting on the man all the same. Another part that was questionable was its semi-antisemitic moments. Though, for all its faults, I can understand why it has stuck around for so long: Lee, who is an arrogant washed-out queen, is entertaining to watch.
 
Final Rating: 4/5