Alcohol – Absolutely contraindicated at any stage of withdrawal. The use of alcohol invariably exacerbates the withdrawal symptoms and leads to relapse. Alcohol can only be tolerated after metabolism returns to normal. This usually takes one month in cases of severe addiction.
Benzedrine. – May relieve temporarily the depression of late withdrawal, disastrous during acute withdrawal, contraindicated at any stage because it produces a state of nervousness for which morphine is the physiological answer.
Cocaine. – The above goes double for cocaine.
Cannabis indica (marijuana). – In late or light withdrawal relieves depression and increases the appetite, in acute withdrawal an unmitigated disaster. (I once smoked marijuana during early withdrawal with nightmarish results.) Cannabis is a sensitizer. If you feel bad already it will make you feel worse. Contraindicated.
Peyote, Bannisteria caapi. – I have not ventured to experiment. The thought of Bannisteria intoxication superimposed on acute withdrawal makes the brain reel. I know of a man who substituted peyote during late withdrawal, claimed to lose all desire for morphine, ultimately died of peyote poisoning.
In cases of severe addiction, definite, physical, withdrawal symptoms persist for one month at least.
I have never seen or heard of a psychotic morphine addict, I mean anyone who showed psychotic symptoms while addicted to an opiate. In fact addicts are drearily sane. Perhaps there is a metabolic incompatibility between schizophrenia and opiate addiction. On the other hand the withdrawal of morphine often precipitates psychotic reactions – usually mild paranoia. Interesting that drugs and methods of treatment that give results in schizophrenia are also of some use in withdrawal: antihistamines, tranquillizers, apomorphine, shock.
Sir Charles Sherington defines pain as ‘the psychic adjunct of an imperative protective reflex.’
The vegetative nervous system expands and contracts in response to visceral rhythms and external stimuli, expanding to stimuli which are experienced as pleasurable – sex, food, agreeable social contacts, etc. – contracting from pain, anxiety, fear, discomfort, boredom. Morphine alters the whole cycle of expansion and contraction, release and tension. The sexual function is deactivated, peristalsis inhibited, the pupils cease to react in response to light and darkness. The organism neither contracts from pain nor expands to normal sources of pleasure. It adjusts to a morphine cycle. The addict is immune to boredom. He can look at his shoe for hours or simply stay in bed. He needs no sexual outlet, no social contacts, no work, no diversion, no exercise, nothing but morphine. Morphine may relieve pain by imparting to the organism some of the qualities of a plant. (Pain could have no function for plants which are, for the most part, stationary, incapable of protective reflexes.)
Scientists look for a non-habit forming morphine that will kill pain without giving pleasure, addicts want – or think they want – euphoria without addiction. I do not see how the functions of morphine can be separated, I think that any effective pain killer will depress the sexual function, induce euphoria and cause addiction. The perfect pain killer would probably be immediately habit forming. (If anyone is interested to develop such a drug, dehydrooxy-heroin might be a good place to start.)
The addict exists in a painless, sexless, timeless state. Transition back to the rhythms of animal life involves the withdrawal syndrome. I doubt if this transition can ever be made in comfort. Painless withdrawal can only be approached.
Cocaine. – Cocaine is the most exhilarating drug I have ever used. The euphoria centres in the head. Perhaps the drug activates pleasure connections directly in the brain. I suspect that an electric current in the right place would produce the same effect. The full exhilaration of cocaine can only be realised by an intravenous injection. The pleasurable effects do not last more than five or ten minutes. If the drug is injected in the skin, rapid elimination vitiates the effects. This goes doubly for sniffing.
It is standard practice for cocaine users to sit up all night shooting cocaine at one minute intervals, alternating with shots of heroin mixed in the same injection to form a ‘speed ball.’ (I have never known an habitual cocaine user who was not a morphine addict.)
The desire for cocaine can be intense. I have spent whole days walking from one drug store to another to fill a cocaine prescription. You may want cocaine intensely, but you don’t have any metabolic need for it. If you can’t get cocaine you eat, you go to sleep and forget it. I have talked with people who used cocaine for years, then were suddenly cut off from their supply. None of them experienced any withdrawal symptoms. Indeed it is difficult to see how a front brain stimulant could be addicting. Addiction seems to be a monopoly of sedatives.
Continued use of cocaine leads to nervousness, depression, sometimes drug psychosis with paranoid hallucinations. The nervousness and depression resulting from cocaine use are not alleviated by more cocaine. They are effectively relieved by morphine. The use of cocaine by a morphine addict always leads to larger and more frequent injections of morphine.
Cannabis Indica (hashish, marijuana). – The effects of this drug have been frequently and luridly described: disturbance of space-time perception, acute sensitivity to impressions, flight of ideas, laughing jags, silliness. Marijuana is a sensitiser, and the results are not always pleasant. It makes a bad situation worse. Depression becomes despair, anxiety panic. I have already mentioned my horrible experience with marijuana during acute morphine withdrawal. I once gave marijuana to a guest who was mildly anxious about something (‘On bum kicks’ as he put it). After smoking half a cigarette he suddenly leapt to his feet screaming ‘I got the fear!’ and rushed out of the house.
An especially unnerving feature of marijuana intoxication is a disturbance of the affective orientation. You do not know whether you like something or not, whether a sensation is pleasant or unpleasant.
The use of marijuana varies greatly with the individual. Some smoke it constantly, some occasionally, not a few dislike it intensely. It seems to be especially unpopular with confirmed morphine addicts, many of whom take a puritanical view of marijuana smoking.
The ill effects of marijuana have been grossly exaggerated in the U.S. Our national drug is alcohol. We tend to regard the use of any other drug with special horror. Anyone given over to these alien vices deserves the complete ruin of his mind and body. People believe what they want to believe without regard for the facts. Marijuana is not habit forming. I have never seen evidence of any ill effects from moderate use. Drug psychosis may result from prolonged and excessive use.
Barbiturates. – The barbiturates are definitely addicting if taken in large quantities over any period of time (about a gramme a day will cause addiction). Withdrawal syndrome is more dangerous than morphine withdrawal, consisting of hallucinations with epilepsy type convulsions. Addicts often injure themselves flopping about on concrete floors (concrete floors being a usual corollary of abrupt withdrawal). Morphine addicts often take barbiturates to potentiate inadequate morphine rations. Some of them become barbiturate addicts as well.
I once took two nembutal capsules (one and a half grains each) every night for four months and suffered no withdrawal symptoms. Barbiturate addiction is a question of quantity. It is probably not a metabolic addiction like morphine, but a mechanical reaction from excessive front brain sedation.
The barbiturate addict presents a shocking spectacle. He can not coordinate, he staggers, falls off bar stools, goes to sleep in the middle of a sentence, drops food out of his mouth. He is confused, quarrelsome and stupid. And he almost always uses other drugs, anything he can lay hands on: alcohol, benzedrene, opiates, marijuana. Barbiturate users are looked down on in addict society: ‘Goof ball bums. They got no class to them.’ The next step down is coal gas and milk, or sniffing ammonia in a bucket – ‘The scrub woman’s kick.’
It seems to me that barbiturates cause the worst possible form of addiction, unsightly, deteriorating, difficult to treat.
Benzedrene. – This is a c
erebral stimulant like cocaine. Large doses cause prolonged sleeplessness with feelings of exhilaration. The period of euphoria is followed by a horrible depression. The drug tends to increase anxiety. It causes indigestion and loss of appetite.
I know of only one case where definite symptoms followed the withdrawal of benzedrene. This was a woman of my acquaintance who used incredible quantities of benzedrene for six months. During this period she developed a drug psychosis and was hospitalized for ten days. She continued the use of benzedrene, but was suddenly cut off. She suffered an asthma type seizure. She could not get her breath and turned blue. I gave her a dose of antihistamine (thepherene) which afforded immediate relief. The symptoms did not return.
Peyote (mescaline). – This is undoubtedly a stimulant. It dilates the pupils, keeps one awake. Peyote is extremely nauseating. Users experience difficulty keeping it down long enough to realize the effect, which is similar, in some respects, to marijuana. There is increased sensitivity to impression, especially to colours. Peyote intoxication causes a peculiar vegetable consciousness or identification with the plant. Everything looks like a peyote plant. It is easy to understand why the Indians believe there is a resident spirit in the peyote cactus.
Overdose of peyote may lead to respiratory paralysis and death. I know of one case. There is no reason to believe that peyote is addicting.
Bannisteria caapi (Harmaline, Banisterine, Telepathine). – Bannisteria caapi is a fast growing vine. The active principle is apparently found throughout the wood of the fresh cut vine. The inner bark is considered most active, and the leaves are never used. It takes a considerable quantity of the vine to feel the full effects of the drug. About five pieces of vine each eight inches long are needed for one person. The vine is crushed and boiled for two or more hours with the leaves of a bush identified as Palicourea sp. rubiacea.
Yage or Ayuahuaska (the most commonly used Indian names for Bannisteria caapi) is a hallucinating narcotic that produces a profound derangement of the senses. In overdose it is a convulsant poison. The antidote is a barbiturate or other strong, anti-convulsant sedative. Anyone taking Yage for the first time should have a sedative ready in the event of an overdose.
The hallucinating properties of Yage have led to its use by Medicine Men to potentiate their powers. They also use it as a cure-all in the treatment of various illnesses. Yage lowers the body temperature and consequently is of some use in the treatment of fever. It is a powerful antihelminthic, indicated for treatment of stomach or intestinal worms. Yage induces a state of conscious anaesthesia, and is used in rites where the initiates must undergo a painful ordeal like whipping with knotted vines, or exposure to the sting of ants.
So far as I could discover only the fresh cut vine is active. I found no way to dry, extract or preserve the active principal. No tinctures proved active. The dried vine is completely inert. The pharmacology of yage requires laboratory research. Since the crude extract is such a powerful, hallucinating narcotic, perhaps even more spectacular results could be obtained with synthetic variations. Certainly the matter warrants further research.1
I did not observe any ill effects that could be attributed to the use of Yage. The Medicine Men who use it continuously in line of duty seem to enjoy normal health. Tolerance is soon acquired so that one can drink the extract without nausea or other ill effect.
Yage is a unique narcotic. Yage intoxication is in some respects similar to intoxication with hashish. In both instances there is a shift of viewpoint, an extension of consciousness beyond ordinary experience. But Yage produces a deeper derangement of the senses with actual hallucinations. Blue flashes in front of the eyes is peculiar to Yage intoxication.
There is a wide range of attitude in regard to Yage. Many Indians and most White users seem to regard it simply as another intoxicant like liquor. In other groups it has ritual use and significance. Among the Jivaro, young men take Yage to contact the spirits of their ancestors and get a briefing for their future life. It is used during initiations to anaesthetize the initiates for painful ordeals. All Medicine Men use it in their practice to foretell the future, locate lost or stolen objects, name the perpetrator of a crime, to diagnose and treat illness.
The alkaloid of Bannisteria caapi was isolated in 1923 by Fisher Cardenas. He called the alkaloid Telepathine, alternately Banisterine. Rumf showed that Telepathine was identical with Harmine, the alkaloid of Perganum Harmala.
Bannisteria caapi is evidently not habit forming.
Nutmeg. – Convicts and sailors sometimes have recourse to nutmeg. About a tablespoon is swallowed with water. Results are vaguely similar to marijuana with side effects of headache and nausea. Death would probably supervene before addiction if such addiction is possible. I have only taken nutmeg once.
There are a number of narcotics of the nutmeg family in use among the Indians of South America. They are usually administered by sniffing a dried powder of the plant. The Medicine Men take these noxious substances, and go into convulsive states. Their twichings and mutterings are thought to have prophetic significance. A friend of mine was violently sick for three days after experimenting with a drug of the nutmeg family in South America.
Datura-scopolamine. – Morphine addicts are frequently poisoned by taking morphine in combination with scopolamine.
I once obtained some ampoules each of which contained one-sixth grain of morphine and one-hundredth grain of scopolamine. Thinking that one-hundredth grain was a negligible quantity, I took six ampoules in one injection. The result was a psychotic state lasting some hours during which I was opportunely restrained by my long suffering landlord. I remembered nothing the following day.
Drugs of the datura group are used by the Indians of South America and Mexico. Fatalities are said to be frequent.
Scopolamine has been used by the Russians as a confession drug with dubious results. The subject may be willing to reveal his secrets, but quite unable to remember them. Often cover story and secret information are inextricably garbled. I understand that mescaline has been very successful in extracting information from suspects.
Morphine addiction is a metabolic illness brought about by the use of morphine. In my opinion psychological treatment is not only useless it is contraindicated. Statistically the people who become addicted to morphine are those who have access to it: doctors, nurses, anyone in contact with black market sources. In Persia where opium is sold without control in opium shops, 70 per cent of the adult population is addicted. So we should psycho-analyse several million Persians to find out what deep conflicts and anxieties have driven them to the use of opium? I think not. According to my experience most addicts are not neurotic and do not need psychotherapy. Apomorphine treatment and access to apomorphine in the event of relapse would certainly give a higher percentage of permanent cures than any programme of ‘psychological rehabilitation.’
* * *
1 Since this was published I have discovered that the alkaloids of Bannisteria are closely related to LSD6 which has been used to produce experimental psychosis. I think they are up to LSD25 already.
About the Author
Say hello to Bradley the Buyer, the best narcotics agent in the business. Attend international playboy A.J.’s annual party, where the punch is to be treated with extreme caution. Meet Dr ‘Fingers’ Schafer, the Lobotomy Kid and his giant centipede, ‘The Complete American De-anxietized Man’. And enter the dark and infernal mind of Bill Lee as he pursues his daily quest for the ultimate merchandise … Provocative, influential, morbidly fascinating, Naked Lunch is an apocalyptic ride through the darker recesses of the human psyche.
WILLIAM BURROUGHS was born in St Louis, Missouri, in 1914. Although largely unpublished for many years, Burroughs was immensely influential among the Beat writers of the 1950s – notably Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg – and already had an underground reputation before the appearance of his first important book, Naked Lunch. First published in France in 1959, it aroused great controversy on publication
and was not available in the US until 1962 and in the UK until 1964. In 1983 Burroughs was elected a Member of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. He died in 1997.
Burroughs’ other works include The Soft Machine (1961), The Ticket That Exploded (1962) and The Place of Dead Roads (1984), all three of which are being brought back into print later this year by Flamingo.
By the Same Author
THE ADDING MACHINE: SELECTED ESSAYS
AH POOK IS HERE AND OTHER TEXTS
BLADE RUNNER: A MOVIE
THE BOOK OF BREETHING (WITH BOB GALE)
THE BURROUGHS FILE
THE CAT INSIDE
CITIES OF THE RED NIGHT
EXTERMINATOR!
GHOST OF A CHANCE
INTERZONE
THE JOB: INTERVIEWS WITH WILLIAM BURROUGHS
JUNKY
LAST WORDS: THE FINAL JOURNALS OF WILLIAM BURROUGHS
THE LAST WORDS OF DUTCH SCHULTZ: A FICTION IN THE FORM
OF A FILM SCRIPT
THE LETTERS OF WILLIAM BURROUGHS
MY EDUCATION: A BOOK OF DREAMS
NAKED LUNCH
NOVA EXPRESS
PAINTING AND GUNS
THE PLACE OF DEAD ROADS
PORT OF SAINTS
WORD VIRUS: THE WILLIAM BURROUGHS READER
QUEER
A REPORT FROM THE BUNKER (WITH VICTOR BOCKRIS)
THE SOFT MACHINE
THE THIRD MIND (WITH BRION GYSIN)
THE TICKET THAT EXPLODED
TORNADO ALLEY (WITH S. CLAY WILSON)
THE WESTERN LANDS
THE WILD BOYS: A BOOK OF THE DEAD
THE YAGÉ LETTERS (WITH ALLEN GINSBERG)
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