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2008-06-04

An odd homage to Burroughs

SEATTLE, Washington - Due to the chaotic mess that was the writing and book-preparation style of William S. Burroughs, passages of text would appear in multiple works, and sometimes multiple times in the same work (some passages in Naked Lunch appear twice). Burroughs biographer Barry Miles seems to have pulled a similar stunt, though I'm not sure if it's mistake or tribute.

Here's one example. From Burroughs: El Hombre Invisible:


Stern had a friend called Harry Phipps, a 24-year-old, short, blond-haired, baby-faced, narcissistic American millionaire.

From Miles's The Beat Hotel:

Stern had a friend named Harry Phipps, a twenty-four-year-old, short, blond-haired, baby-faced, narcissistic American millionaire,...

Those look like the type of minor text changes that a student makes when trying to make it look like they didn't plagiarize something.

I saw some more examples but the former book is poorly indexed and the latter is not indexed at all so I'm not going to hunt for them.

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