William S. Burroughs: Obscenity, a Decapitated Mouse, and the Deadly William Tell Routine

William S. Burroughs was a literary icon whose novel Naked Lunch, one of the signature works of the Beat Generation, was banned and went on trial for obscenity. His writing inspired generations of musicians, from the Rolling Stones and Patti Smith to Nirvana and Sonic Youth. But long before all that, in 1951, when he was an unknown and mostly failed writer, William S. Burroughs made the most fateful decision of his life when he pointed a gun at a highball glass balanced on top of his wife’s head…and pulled the trigger. To see the full list of contributors, see the show notes at www.disgracelandpod.com. To listen to Disgraceland ad free and get access to a monthly exclusive episode, weekly bonus content and more, become a Disgraceland All Access member at disgracelandpod.com/membership. Sign up for our newsletter and get the inside dirt on events, merch and other awesomeness - GET THE NEWSLETTER Follow Jake and DISGRACELAND: Instagram YouTube X (formerly Twitter)  Facebook Fan Group TikTok Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Musicians. Movie stars. Mayhem. Murder. DISGRACELAND is the award-winning podcast that tells the unbelievable but true stories from the dark side of entertainment history. Rockstars getting away with murder and behaving very badly. Actors engulfed in scandal. Pop stars plotted against and terrorized. Taylor Swift escaping her stalkers. Jerry Lee Lewis allegedly murdering his wife. Brittany Murphy’s suspicious death. Big Lurch, the hip hop star who ate his roommate. The assassination of John Lennon. The Grateful Dead, the CIA, the LSD that turned on the USA, and the real reason Neil Young gave Charles Manson his motorcycle. Robert Downey Jr.’s redemptive rise from addiction. Anthony Bourdain’s destructive lust for life. The true crime stories that inspired Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska and the serial killer inspired by AC/DC’s Highway To Hell. Welcome to DISGRACELAND, where these stories and more will grip you to the edge of your seat and cause you to binge episode after episode.  DISGRACELAND publishes new, fully scripted, and sound-designed episodes every Tuesday and bonus episodes featuring listener voicemails, texts, and emails on Thursdays.  DISGRACELAND is not a journalistic podcast. It is an entertainment podcast inspired by true events. Certain dialogue and scenes are sometimes fictionalized for dramatic purposes, as they are in most scripted entertainment based on true events. Sources and credits for each episode are available at www.disgracelandpod.com . To listen to DISGRACELAND ad-free and get access to an exclusive monthly episode, weekly bonus content, and more, become a Disgraceland All Access member at www.disgracelandpod.com/membership.