Read Online Naked Lunch by William Burroughs - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: William Burroughs
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Anopheles mosquitos
are
silent.) Thickly carpeted, discreet nursing home in Kensington: stiff brocade chair anda cup of tea, the Swedish modern living room with water hyacinths in a yellow bowl – outside the China blue Northern sky and drifting clouds, under bad water-colors of the dying medical student.
‘A schnaps I think Frau Underschnitt.’
The doctor was talking into a phone with a chess board in front of him. ‘Quite a severe lesion I think … of course without to see the fluoroscope.’ He picks upthe knight and then replaces it thoughtfully. ‘Yes.…both lungs … quite definitely.’ He replaces the receiver and turns to Carl. ‘I have observed these people show amazingly quick wound recovery, with low incidence of infection. It is always the lungs here … pneumonia and, of course, Old Faithful.’ The doctor grabs Carl’s cock, leaping into the air with a coarse peasant guffaw. His European smile ignoresthe misbehavior of a child or an animal. He goes on smoothly in his eerily unaccented, disembodied English. ‘Our Old Faithful Bacillus Koch.’ The doctor clicks his heels and bows his head. ‘Otherwise they would multiply their stupid peasant asshole into the sea, is it not?’ He shrieks, thrusting his face into Carl’s. Carl retreats sideways with the grey wall of rain behind him.
‘Isn’t there someplace where he can be treated?’
‘I think there is some sort of
sanitarium,’
he drags outthe word with ambiguous obscenity, ‘up at the District Capital. I will write for you the address.’
‘Chemical therapy?’
His voice falls flat and heavy in the damp air.
‘Who can say. They are all stupid peasants, and the worst of all peasants are the so-called educated. These people should not only be preventedfrom learning to read, but from learning to talk as well. No need to prevent them from thinking; nature has done that.’
‘Here is the
address,’
the doctor whispered without moving his lips.
He dropped a pill of paper into Carl’s hand. His dirty fingers, shiny over the dirt, rested on Carl’s sleeve.
‘There is the matter of my fee.’
Carl slipped him a wadded banknote … and the doctor faded intothe grey twilight, seedy and furtive as an old junky.
Carl saw Joselito in a big clean room full of light, with private bath and concrete balcony. And nothing to talk about there in the cold empty room, water hyacinths growing in a yellow bowl and the China blue sky and drifting clouds, fear flickering in and out of his eyes. When he smiled the fear flew away in little pieces of light, lurkedenigmatically in the high cool corners of the room. And what could I say feeling death around me, and the little broken images that come before sleep, there in the mind?
‘They will send me to the new sanitarium tomorrow. Come and visit me. I will be there alone.’
He coughed and took a codeineeta.
‘Doctor I understand, that is I have been given to understand, I have read and heard – not a medicalman myself – don’t pretend to be – that the concept of sanitarium treatment has been more or less supplanted or at least very definitely supplemented by chemical therapy. Is thisaccurate in your opinion? What I mean to say is, Doctor, please tell me in all sincerity, as one human being to another, what is your opinion of chemical versus sanitarium therapy. Are you a
partisan
?’
The doctor’s liversick Indian face was blank as a dealer’s.
‘Completely modern, as you can see,’ he gestures toward the room with the purple fingers of bad circulation. ‘Bath … water … flowers. The lot.’ He finished in Cockney English with a triumphant smirk. ‘I will write for you a letter.’
‘This letter? For the sanitarium?’
The doctor was speaking from a land of black rocks and great, iridescent brown lagoons.‘The furniture … modern and comfortable. You
find
it so of course?’
Carl could not see the sanitarium owing to a false front of green stucco topped by an intricate neon
are
silent.) Thickly carpeted, discreet nursing home in Kensington: stiff brocade chair anda cup of tea, the Swedish modern living room with water hyacinths in a yellow bowl – outside the China blue Northern sky and drifting clouds, under bad water-colors of the dying medical student.
‘A schnaps I think Frau Underschnitt.’
The doctor was talking into a phone with a chess board in front of him. ‘Quite a severe lesion I think … of course without to see the fluoroscope.’ He picks upthe knight and then replaces it thoughtfully. ‘Yes.…both lungs … quite definitely.’ He replaces the receiver and turns to Carl. ‘I have observed these people show amazingly quick wound recovery, with low incidence of infection. It is always the lungs here … pneumonia and, of course, Old Faithful.’ The doctor grabs Carl’s cock, leaping into the air with a coarse peasant guffaw. His European smile ignoresthe misbehavior of a child or an animal. He goes on smoothly in his eerily unaccented, disembodied English. ‘Our Old Faithful Bacillus Koch.’ The doctor clicks his heels and bows his head. ‘Otherwise they would multiply their stupid peasant asshole into the sea, is it not?’ He shrieks, thrusting his face into Carl’s. Carl retreats sideways with the grey wall of rain behind him.
‘Isn’t there someplace where he can be treated?’
‘I think there is some sort of
sanitarium,’
he drags outthe word with ambiguous obscenity, ‘up at the District Capital. I will write for you the address.’
‘Chemical therapy?’
His voice falls flat and heavy in the damp air.
‘Who can say. They are all stupid peasants, and the worst of all peasants are the so-called educated. These people should not only be preventedfrom learning to read, but from learning to talk as well. No need to prevent them from thinking; nature has done that.’
‘Here is the
address,’
the doctor whispered without moving his lips.
He dropped a pill of paper into Carl’s hand. His dirty fingers, shiny over the dirt, rested on Carl’s sleeve.
‘There is the matter of my fee.’
Carl slipped him a wadded banknote … and the doctor faded intothe grey twilight, seedy and furtive as an old junky.
Carl saw Joselito in a big clean room full of light, with private bath and concrete balcony. And nothing to talk about there in the cold empty room, water hyacinths growing in a yellow bowl and the China blue sky and drifting clouds, fear flickering in and out of his eyes. When he smiled the fear flew away in little pieces of light, lurkedenigmatically in the high cool corners of the room. And what could I say feeling death around me, and the little broken images that come before sleep, there in the mind?
‘They will send me to the new sanitarium tomorrow. Come and visit me. I will be there alone.’
He coughed and took a codeineeta.
‘Doctor I understand, that is I have been given to understand, I have read and heard – not a medicalman myself – don’t pretend to be – that the concept of sanitarium treatment has been more or less supplanted or at least very definitely supplemented by chemical therapy. Is thisaccurate in your opinion? What I mean to say is, Doctor, please tell me in all sincerity, as one human being to another, what is your opinion of chemical versus sanitarium therapy. Are you a
partisan
?’
The doctor’s liversick Indian face was blank as a dealer’s.
‘Completely modern, as you can see,’ he gestures toward the room with the purple fingers of bad circulation. ‘Bath … water … flowers. The lot.’ He finished in Cockney English with a triumphant smirk. ‘I will write for you a letter.’
‘This letter? For the sanitarium?’
The doctor was speaking from a land of black rocks and great, iridescent brown lagoons.‘The furniture … modern and comfortable. You
find
it so of course?’
Carl could not see the sanitarium owing to a false front of green stucco topped by an intricate neon
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