Silence is only frightening to people who are compulsively verbalizing.

Burroughs frames silence not as an inherent void but as a mirror that exposes dependence on constant speech. If someone is “compulsively verbalizing,” quiet becomes threatening because it removes the habitual buffer of words—forcing attention onto unprocessed thoughts, bodily unease, or the social anxiety of not performing. The line also fits Burroughs’s broader suspicion of language as a controlling system: incessant talk can function like a drug, soothing and distracting while reinforcing patterns of conformity. In that light, silence is a kind of resistance or clarity, frightening mainly to those who need language to keep discomfort at bay.