“There is only one thing a writer can write about: what is in front of his senses at the moment of writing… I am a recording instrument… I do not presume to impose “story” “plot” “continuity”… insofar as I succeed in direct recording of certain areas of psychic process I may have limited function… I am not an entertainer…” from Naked Lunch
Apparently, Burroughs recorded life using more than a pen. A new book has been published, Taking Shots: The Photographs of WIlliam S. Burroughs, the catalog that accompanied an exhibit of William S. Burroughs’s photographs at The Photographers Gallery in London. It seems there are more than a few writers who also took pictures, including Jack London, Eudora Welty, Ralph Ellison, Wright Morris, and William Faulkner.
It’s funny – I know it’s my photographic bias, but I am actually more familiar with Wright Morris as a photographer than as a writer!
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Oh, I’m with you there! I wasn’t aware that he was a novelist until I started researching photographers and writers in his era. Check out his novel The Home Place that includes his wonderful black and white photos.
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