"Miles familiarizes even old close readers with a fine map of Burroughs' mind."  —Allen Ginsberg Iconoclast; visionary; homosexual crusader; drug advocate; teacher and elder statesman to Jack Kracouac, Allen Ginsberg, and the Beats; anti-hero guru to each successive counter-culture generation—this is a portait of a man who remains one of the most complex and controversial American writers of the 20th century. After killing his wife in a bizarre shooting accident, he moved to Tangier where he lived in male brothel and wrote his celebrated bestseller Naked Lunch—in Newsweek's words "A masterpiece. A cry from Hell."—as a series of letters to Allen Ginsberg. He lived at the Beat Hotel in Paris and spent a decade in London before returning as prodigal son to New York in 1974 after 25 years of self imposed exile. Following Burroughs' death in August 1997, Barry Miles updated his riveting, unconventional biography of this legendary provocateur.