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I am not a person and I am not an animal. There is something I am here for something I must do before I can go.

William S. Burroughs

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William S. Burroughs
Age: 83 †
Born: 1914
Born: February 5
Died: 1997
Died: August 11
Essayist
Novelist
Painter
Photographer
Poet
Prosaist
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
Writer
St. Louis
Missouri
William Seward Burroughs II
Uilʹi︠a︡m Berrouz
William Lee
William Burroughs
Ouiliam Baroouz
William Seward Burroughs
Willy Lee
William S. (William Seward) Burroughs
Animal
Persons
Person
Must
Something

More quotes by William S. Burroughs

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I bear my burden proudly for all to see, to conquer prejudice and ignorance and hate with knowledge and sincerity and love. Whenever you are threatened by a hostile presence, you emit a thick cloud of love like an octopus squirts out ink.
William S. Burroughs
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For instance, they [The Federal Narcotics Bureau ] give out that marijuana is a harmful and habit-forming drug, and it simply isn't. They claim that you can get addicted to opiates with one shot, and you can't. They over-estimate the physical bad effects, and so forth.
William S. Burroughs
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danger is a biologic necessity, like dreams. if you face death, for that time, for the period of direct confrontation, you are immortal.
William S. Burroughs
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The people in power will not disappear voluntarily, giving flowers to the cops just isn't going to work. This thinking is fostered by the establishment they like nothing better than love and nonviolence. The only way I like to see cops given flowers is in a flower pot from a high window.
William S. Burroughs
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Our national drug is alcohol. We tend to regard the use of any other drug with special horror.
William S. Burroughs
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The world wasn't a more tolerant place when I was a young man. Rather, they simply sidestepped all the issues.
William S. Burroughs
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When you get to be my age there are more and more people you have known that you miss. Brion [Gysin], Antony Balch, Ian Summerville are ones I think of right away I was quite close to.
William S. Burroughs
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Every man has inside himself a parasitic being who is acting not at all to his advantage.
William S. Burroughs
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The American uppermiddle-class citizen is a composite of negatives. He is largely delineated by what he is not.
William S. Burroughs
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Man must get away from verbal forms to attain the consciousness, that which is there to be perceived at hand.
William S. Burroughs
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Junk is not, like alcohol or weed, a means to increased enjoyment of life. Junk is not a kick. It is a way of life.
William S. Burroughs
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Junk takes everything and gives nothing but insurance against junk sickness.
William S. Burroughs
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In the event of atomic war there is a tremendous biological advantage in the so-called undeveloped areas that have a high birth rate and high death rate because, man, they can plow under those mutations.
William S. Burroughs
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England has the most sordid literary scene I've ever seen. They all meet in the same pub. This guy's writing a foreword for this person. They all have to give radio programs, they have to do all this just in order to scrape by. They're all scratching each other's backs.
William S. Burroughs
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Like pregnant women lose their teeth feeding the stranger, junkies lose their yellow fangs feeding the monkey.
William S. Burroughs
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[Political movements] both favor alcohol and are against pot.
William S. Burroughs
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I detest limitations of any kind, and intend to establish my ass some place where I am a virgin on the police blotter.
William S. Burroughs
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How far would people get in physics if discovery was described as disgusting - Your formula is disgusting and filthy? Not very far.
William S. Burroughs
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Knowing you might not make it... in that knowledge courage is born.
William S. Burroughs
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Now Christianity sounded good at first to the naive convert. Love, peace and charity - what's wrong with that? I'll tell you what's wrong - a series of unprecedented horrors perpetrated by so-called Christians: The Inquisition, the Conquistadores, the American Indian wars, slavery, Hiroshima and the present-day Bible Belt.
William S. Burroughs