Herbert Huncke, a charismatic street hustler who inspired writers like William Burroughs and Jack Kerouac and was featured as characters in their books, has died at the age of 81.
He died Thursday of congestive heart failure at Beth Israel Hospital, said his friend and literary executor, Jerry Poynton.Huncke, whose name rhymed with junkie, introduced Kerouac to the term "beat," gave Burroughs his first fix, and guided them as well as poet Allen Ginsberg and others through the seamy Times Square of the 1940s.
They, in turn, made him an icon.
Huncke became the main character (Herbert) of Burroughs' first book, "Junkie." He appears under his own name in numerous Ginsberg poems. And Kerouac put him in his 1957 classic, "On The Road," as Elmo Hassel.
Huncke also shows up as "Junkey" in Kerouac's "The Town and the City" and as "Huck" in his "Visions of Cody" and "Book of Dreams."
Huncke was born in Greenfield, Mass., and ran away from home as a young teen. He said that he began using drugs at age 12, prostituted himself at age 16 and stole throughout his life.
"I always followed the road of least resistance," he said in a 1992 interview. "I just continued to do what I wanted. I didn't weigh or balance things. I started out this way and I never really changed."
Huncke wrote four books. His first, "Huncke's Journal," was published in 1965. His most recent, "Guilty of Everything," was published in 1990.