Fever Dreams is a site offering interpretations (or "shared delusions") of Steely Dan lyrics. SD fans are quite the well-read bunch, and seem pretty intent on tracing the literary sources of some of the more far-out lyrics. On the Pretzel Logic page alone, we have appearances by Burroughs, Borges, and Hegel.

I liked this part about Fagen and Becker's songwriting process:

Sometimes Steely Dan lyrics just seem random to me -- in the same way a Burroughs cut-up seems random, while making perfect sense and creating powerful images. In the PERFORMING SONGWRITER interview, Our Heroes reveal part of the process they sometimes use to arrive at what seems like a predetermined or actual meaning:

It's a stunning level of accomplishment they've achieved by being intricately involved with every aspect of the creative process, as consciously careful with each word of every line as they are with each beat of the kick drum and the snare. Though the ongoing brilliance of their seamless and soulfully singable songs might often seem to be the product of some kind of spontaneous genius, it's actually the result of a lot of hard work, as B&F explained. Take the flowing chorus of "West of Hollywood," for example:

I'm way deep into nothing special
Riding the crest of a wave breaking
just west of Hollywood

It's a single sentence that evolved through a profusion of lyrical permutations beforethe ideal form was discovered. "One trick of writing is to use the mechanics of typing things over and over again as a way of exercising and developing an idea," Becker said. To illustrate this technique, he shared some of the variations he and Fagen generated for this line:

I'm way deep into nothing special...
...coming from a place of power just west of ...
...with a base of support located just west of ...
...in a matrix with its nexus just west of ...
...situated as I am in the crescent just west of ...
...having as my target the citizens just west of ...
...in a cluster franchise operation just west of ...
...and business is booming in the triangle just west of ...

All the songs on the new album went through this lengthy process of thought and revision,each the result of many pages of notes, character development, and explorations into the best ways to compel and conclude narratives. Each character emerged only after sessions of abundant B&F banter and discovery, resulting in a rich emotional subtext that serves as a foundation for all these songs.
So in other words, the characters often emerge, rather than being fully formed and all growed-up before a single word hits the page. This Rubik's Cube they then toss out to us, challenging us to make all the elements match up somehow.And most of us have to ask others and discuss and read up on obscure stuff, because when it comes to knowing what lurks in the hearts of men, really,only the Shadow knows.