William S Burroughs quotes

You must learn to exist with no religion, no country, no allies. You must learn to live alone in silence.

Artists to my mind are the real architects of change, and not the political legislators who implement change after the fact.

The purpose of technology is not to confuse the brain but to serve the body.

Man is an artifact designed for space travel. He is not designed to remain in his present biologic state any more than a tadpole is designed to remain a tadpole.

This is a war universe. War all the time. That is its nature. There may be other universes based on all sorts of other principles, but ours seems to be based on war and games.

Desperation is the raw material of drastic change. Only those who can leave behind everything they have ever believed in can hope to escape.

Happiness is a byproduct of function, purpose, and conflict; those who seek happiness for itself seek victory without war.

After one look at this planet any visitor from outer space would say 'I want to see the manager.'

Silence is only frightening to people who are compulsively verbalizing.

The cat does not offer services. The cat offers itself. Of course he wants care and shelter. You don't buy love for nothing.

There couldn't be a society of people who didn't dream. They'd be dead in two weeks.

In my writing I am acting as a map maker, an explorer of psychic areas, a cosmonaut of inner space, and I see no point in exploring areas that have already been thoroughly surveyed.

No body of knowledge needs an organizational policy. Organizational policy can only impede the advancement of knowledge. There is a basic incompatibility between any organization and freedom of thought.

This is a war universe. War all the time. That is its nature. There may be other universes based on all sorts of other principles, but ours seems to be based on war and games.

Man is an artifact designed for space travel. He is not designed to remain in his present biologic state any more than a tadpole is designed to remain a tadpole.

Most serious writers refuse to make themselves available to the things that technology is doing. I've never been able to understand this sort of fear.

Your knowledge of what is going on can only be superficial and relative.

The way to kill a man or a nation is to cut off his dreams, the way the whites are taking care of the Indians: killing their dreams, their magic, their familiar spirits.

This is a war universe. War all the time. That is its nature. There may be other universes based on all sorts of other principles, but ours seems to be based on war and games.

After a shooting spree, they always want to take the guns away from the people who didn't do it. I sure as hell wouldn't want to live in a society where the only people allowed guns are the police and the military.

Like all pure creatures, cats are practical.

No one owns life, but anyone who can pick up a frying pan owns death.

Happiness is a byproduct of function, purpose, and conflict; those who seek happiness for itself seek victory without war.

No body of knowledge needs an organizational policy. Organizational policy can only impede the advancement of knowledge. There is a basic incompatibility between any organization and freedom of thought.

Language is a virus from outer space.

Thinking is not enough. There is no final enough of wisdom, experience - any... thing.

In deep sadness there is no place for sentimentality.

Visual art and writing don't exist on an aesthetic hierarchy that positions one above the other, because each is capable of things the other can't do at all. Sometimes one picture is equal to 30 pages of discourse, just as there are things images are completely incapable of communicating.

Language is a virus from outer space.

You must learn to exist with no religion, no country, no allies. You must learn to live alone in silence.

Desperation is the raw material of drastic change. Only those who can leave behind everything they have ever believed in can hope to escape.

Most of the trouble in this world has been caused by folks who can't mind their own business, because they have no business of their own to mind, any more than a smallpox virus has.

Happiness is a byproduct of function, purpose, and conflict; those who seek happiness for itself seek victory without war.