Comments on: William Burroughs, the Morro Castle Disaster and the Mystery of “Twilight’s Last Gleamings”: A Conspiracy Theory

By: Max

Max — Wed, 06 Dec 2023 20:21:35 +0000

I agree that “Twilight’s Last Gleamings” seemed completely out of place in Nova Express. However, many of Burroughs’ books include a chapter or two that doesn’t fit with the content or style of the overall work. For example, we get “The Mayan Caper” in The Soft Machine – a chapter of straight narrative without cut-ups in an otherwise very fragmented book. Similarly, Burroughs himself said that the first chapter (“Tio Mate Smiles”) in The Wild Boys doesn’t really fit well with the rest of the material, either style-wise or thematically.

Perhaps the ubiquity of the seemingly out of place chapters is there to represent a brief, lucid interlude as one wakes from a dream-like state, before falling right back into it.

By: Gary Lee-Nova

Gary Lee-Nova — Thu, 23 Nov 2023 03:23:33 +0000

Jed, Thank you.

Your thorough deep dives into “Twilight’s Last Gleamings” have produced another excellent guide to the work of WSB.

And, the photographic pictorials work very well with your essay.

You may remember that “Nova Express” was the ‘novel’ that I could relate to as a first, a published Hardbound ‘BOOK’ that I was able to buy and read.

For now, I must locate the project of Oliver Harris involving the restoration of NOVA EXPRESS.

By: juls

juls — Tue, 15 Jun 2021 22:50:22 +0000

Great article very interesting raises lots of questions.
Im wondering how , if it’s possible , it would be confirmed that burroughs was aware of this.
I think its very likely but dont know how it would be proven .

By: Jim Pennington

Jim Pennington — Sat, 05 Jun 2021 20:48:52 +0000

i’ve always wondered about Twilight’s …. it has such a reporter feel to it.. but it never crossed my mind that there may have been a real event outside of the usual myths about the Titanic. The radio man is straight out of a yellow press sensation…
Wonderful and informative and gleaming piece, Jed – thanks.