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" Most people don't see what's going on around them. That's my principal message to writers: 'For God's sake, keep your eyes open. Notice what's going on around you.' "

William S. Burroughs

God

Eyes

You

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" An addict never stops growing. Stupider. "

" In deep sadness there is no place for sentimentality. "

" My relationships with my cats has saved me from a deadly, pervasive ignorance. "

William S. Burroughs

Relationships

Ignorance

" Every man has inside himself a parasitic being who is acting not at all to his advantage. "

" 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. "

" Americans have a special horror of giving up control, of letting things happen in their own way without interference. "

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

" How I hate those who are dedicated to producing conformity. "

" 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. "

" Nothing is true, everything is permitted. "

" Smash the control images. Smash the control machine. "

" Speaking for myself, art differs from writing in that I never know what I'm going to paint until I paint it, so it's almost like automatic writing. A writer, on the other hand, can't help but know what he's going to write, because the activity demands a degree of premeditation. "

" Virtue is simply happiness, and happiness is a by-product of function. You are happy when you are functioning. "

" The aim of education is the knowledge, not of facts, but of values. "

" Junk is the ideal product... the ultimate merchandise. No sales talk necessary. The client will crawl through a sewer and beg to buy. "

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

William S. Burroughs

Life

Pick

" The only possible ethic is to do what one wants to do. "

" Scientology is a model control system, a state in fact with its own courts, police, rewards and penalties. "

" Some people like neat suburbs. I always am attracted to the rundown and the old and the offbeat. "

William S. Burroughs

Old

People

" 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 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. "

" In the U.S., you have to be a deviant or die of boredom. "

" I see no reason why the artistic world can't absolutely merge with Madison Avenue. Pop art is a move in that direction. Why can't we have advertisements with beautiful words and beautiful images? "

" Your mind will answer most questions if you learn to relax and wait for the answer. "

" 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. "

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

" Black magic operates most effectively in preconscious, marginal areas. Casual curses are the most effective. "

" It is indeed difficult to make a living as a writer, and my advice to anyone contemplating a literary career is to have some other trade. "

" Changes... can only be effected by alterations in the original. The only thing not prerecorded in a prerecorded universe are the prerecordings themselves. The copies can only repeat themselves word for word. A virus is a copy. You can pretty it up, cut it up, scramble it - it will reassemble in the same form. "