New WS Burroughs/Kerouac Novel

[Tuckerfan]

New in the sense that its never been published.

Now “And the Hippos,” originally copyrighted in 1945, has been published by Grove Press. It is a valuable document for those of us interested in the Beat generation, valuable as much for the detailed and fascinating explanatory afterword by James Grauerholz, Burrough’s longtime secretary and executor, as for the actual text. As a work of fiction for the general reader — well, it’s not exactly “On the Road” or “Naked Lunch,” nor, I suppose, does it pretend to be.

“And the Hippos” was composed by Burroughs and Kerouac in alternating chapters, and one sign that neither had yet found the style that was to make them famous is that often you have to look up at the top of the page to remind yourself who is writing what. They both seem to be trying to adhere to a hardboiled murder-mystery style that is more appropriate to Burroughs’ pessimistic vision than to Kerouac’s ecstatic optimism, but that most of the time sounds like neither.

The reviews its been getting indicate that its more interesting as a historical document than as a literary work.