William S. Burroughs (1914-1997) – William Burroughs, Lawrence, Kansas, July 18, 1995 – photo: Allen Ginsberg, courtesy Stanford University Libraries / Allen Ginsberg Estate
In keeping with yesterday’s posting, here’s a brief gathering of “stablemates” (they died on this same day)
starting with… Wild Bill Hickok, folk hero and legendary Western gunfighter. (It turns out he only killed six or seven, and not the hundreds that the myths had him kill, but no matter).
One of the truly most evil, malicious men – (he died in 1986) – the lawyer, Roy Cohn
One of the great thinkers of post-war times, now sadly forgotten (or curiously neglected) – Paul Goodman (who died, aged 60 in 1972)
One of the most beautiful voices (wonderfully preserved for posterity) – the Italian tenor, Enrico Caruso (he died in the Grand Hotel Vesuvio in Naples, in 1921)
Another musician, but this time a fighter and an activist and the progenitor of a whole musical genre, AfroBeat – Fela Ransome-Kuti (dying in Lagos in 1997, from complications relating to AIDS, though he had been an AIDS denialist and his widow strenuously denied that that had been the cause)
A long way away from William Burroughs (but his cool, one might argue, not so very far away) – Wallace Stevens
A motley crew. William didn’t get the chance to choose them.
