Jack Kerouac & William S. Burroughs in Oui Magazine

Description

Since the 1950’s, the men’s magazines had become unlikely sanctuaries for literary outlaws. The Beats, the outsiders, and the sci-fi dreamers were all perfectly at home in the glossy pages of “adult” magazines that mixed fiction, philosophy, and flesh. While the mainstream publications generally kept their distance, “adult” publications offered freedom, readership, and a check. Playboy, Oui, Adam, Cavalier, Hustler and Swank gave serious writers space to stretch, often pairing their words with art and photography that matched their provocation. For most of the writers who appeared in this space, it wasn’t a sellout—it was just another way to pay the rent.

In these two issues of Oui, the Beat spirit is fully alive. The August 1973 issue features the Burroughs’ essay “Face to Face: William Burroughs Observes Its Rites”, a surreal report from Morocco on the Bou Jeloud festival and the hallucinatory music of Joujouka—an echo of his Interzone years. The January 1973 issue includes “Before the Road” by Kerouac, a posthumous piece that captures a pre-On the Road Cody and the first stirrings of what would become the Beat generation. Both pieces are vivid snapshots of literary rebellion meeting 1970s nudie gloss—and rarely turn up this clean, let alone with their original mailer sleeves.

A beautiful pair of 1973 Oui issues that bridge Beat literature with 1970s men’s entertainment—Kerouac and Burroughs in glossy exile, right where they belong.