Charles Bukowski

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El escritor estadounidense Charles Bukowski, experto en la cruda y en los abismos humanos, te dice cómo explotar tu depresión de forma que puedas convertirla en una fuente de claridad.

Charles Bukowski, quien fuera llamado el “[poeta] laureado de los bajos fondos de América”, exploró y explotó sus propios submundos. Bukowski padeció los abusos de un padre alcohólico, la pobreza y el tedio de la existencia y, por supuesto, la depresión, de primera mano y con sus parejas. Como pocos Bukowski logró sacar provecho, casi como un alquimista, de estas situaciones y transformarlas en literatura y en una particular filosofía.

En este video Bukowski te dice cómo enfrentar la depresión, sin medias tintas. En vez de esquivarla, entegarte a ella en un intensivo, sin aburguesamiento o rechazo de lo negativo. Hay que amar y dejarse caer en  la sombra. “Me meto en la cama por tres días y cuatro noches, cierro las cortinas y solo salgo de la cama para tomar una cerveza. Salgo de ahi completamente iluminado por dos o tres meses”. Agrega Bukowski: “todos deberian de irse a la cama cuando estén bajoneados, estamos obsesionados con que tenemos que hacer… un círculo de levantarse y hacer algo, arriba, abajo”

Interesante reflexión de Bukowski: en vez de luchar contra ella, dejarse poseer por la depresión. De esta forma se acelera el proceso de sanación y se extraen los diamantes de la oscuridad.

[Open Culture]

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Books & Review | Cole Garner HillUpdated: Aug 16, 2012 04:23 PM EDT

Today would have been author Charles Bukowski's 91st birthday. One of literature's dirtiest, crotchetiest old men, and damn proud of it, Bukowski died on this day in 1994 of Leukemia, shortly after completing his final novel, "Pulp."  

If you've been to art school, taken a poetry class, or had an unusually disaffected adolescence, you're likely aware of his work. But even to the uninitiated, Bukowski's presence should still be recognizable. Much like William S. Burroughs, and Hunter S. Thompson, Bukowski's writing, and the man himself, has coalesced to such an extent with popular, and counter-culture, that it has been absorbed into the fabric of American consciousness.  His influence on art, music, writing, and our culture as a whole is undeniable.

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Even if you're unaware of the embarrassment of riches hiding in Bukowski's collections of fiction and poetry, it's likely you've rubbed elbows somewhere along the way with his distinctive spit-fire spirit. His writing has been championed the world over by rock stars like Kurt Kobain, and celebrities like Johnny Depp, and was the subject of a documentary that featured Sean Penn, Tom Waits, Harry Dean Stanton,  and Bono  -- not to mention several film adaptations of his books, the most recent, 2005's "Factotum" starring Matt Dillon.

In honor of that cantankerous wisenheimer, read along below for some timeless Bukowski wisdom.

"Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must live."

"We have wasted History like a bunch of drunks shooting dice back in the men's crapper of the local bar."

"Pain doesn't make anything, nor does poverty. The artist is there first. What becomes of him depends upon his luck. If his luck is good (worldly-speaking) he becomes a bad artist. If his luck is bad, he becomes a good one."

"It was true that I didn't have much ambition, but there ought to be a place for people without ambition, I mean a better place than the one usually reserved. How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 6:30 a.m. by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?"

"An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way. An artist says a hard thing in a simple way."

"if I suffer at this

typewriter
think how I'd feel
among the lettuce-
pickers of Salinas?

I think of the men
I've known in
factories
with no way to
get out -
choking while living
choking while laughing
at Bob Hope or Lucille
Ball while
2 or 3 children beat
tennis balls against
the walls.

some suicides are never
recorded."

"Death, at last, is a bore - no more than pulling a shade. we do not die all at once, generally, but piece by piece, little by little. the young die hardest and live hardest and understand nothing. but they are the most generous and the truest and better fit to lead than the cautious wise."

Did we forget your favorite? Let us know in the comments?

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08/09/2012 às 09:33:39 - Atualizado em 09/09/2012 às 12:28:34

Em um universo povoado de bêbados, prostitutas e marginalizados, que o jornalista e escritor brasileiro João Antonio chama de merdunchos, Charles Bukowski (1920 – 1994) construiu a sua literatura. Bebendo do underground, não tardou para que as façanhas, em prosa e poesia, do Velho Safado fossem reconhecidas pelo seu valor, seja a estima literária, ou o resgate histórico de uma geração influenciada pelas liberdades pós-década de 1960.

E, embora o material disponível em português seja vasto, alguns poemas ainda permaneciam no limbo do ineditismo no Brasil. Tentando vencer essa barreira, o poeta e tradutor curitibano Fernando Koproski decidiu selecionar e traduzir mais de 40 poesias, que ainda não haviam recebido sua devida tradução, em uma coletânea, “Amor é tudo que dissemos que não era” (7 Letras), que acaba de chegar às livrarias.

Em tom confessional e desesperado, a obra bukowskiana emana mais que o singelo fazer literário, produzindo verdadeiros retratos do cotidiano, como em “Um poema é uma cidade”, “O homem no piano” ou “Paraíso bastardo”, que não poupam palavras para descrever a sordidez e o sentimento de inadequação ao status quo. É algo que Koproski define como “realismo desconcertante”.

Trabalhando desde 2008 no livro, o curitibano não esconde a importância da empreitada. “Houve, sobretudo, o critério de apresentar um panorama significativo dos livros inéditos de poesia do Bukowski em português, por meio de poemas representativos de seus diversos temas”, afirmou Koproski, que é também responsável por outra coletânea do Buk, “Essa loucura roubada que não desejo a ninguém a ser a mim mesmo amém” e por um retrospecto da obra poética do canadense Leonard Cohen, “Atrás das linhas inimigas de meu amor”.

 Antimanual

 Repleto de ironia e sarcasmo, “Amor é tudo o que dissemos que não era”, é na verdade, um antimanual de conduta, colocando lado a lado a realidade dos esquecidos e o falso academismo do sacrifício literário. Prova cabal disso, “Então você quer ser um escritor?” dá a deixa para iniciantes: “se você estiver fazendo isso por dinheiro ou/ fama,/não faça./se você estiver fazendo isso porque deseja/mulheres em sua cama,/não faça”.

 Dispensando as formalidades, Koproski conseguiu um resultado inigualável com a “prosa doida” do Velho, em uma simplicidade e ferocidade que a poética bukowskiana exige. “Ao contrário do que os teóricos da tradução pregam insistentemente, cada caso é um caso e deve ser estudado em separado”, disparou.

 Arrebanhando multidões, Bukowski deixou sua marca na literatura, que não raras vezes, é confundida com os beats, mas que, colocando de lado rótulos, ajudou a formar leitores e leituras em um mundo cada vez mais consumido pelo instantâneo e obsoleto.

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* Mislele Souza da Silva

Charles Bukowski é um escritor muito comentado atualmente, destacando-se o papel das redes sociais na circulação de suas ideias. Sendo ele um autor “marginal” do século 20, fica o questionamento: por que ele faz tanto sucesso entre os jovens? Para tentar responder a essa pergunta é necessário falar um pouco do autor. Bukowski nasceu na Alemanha em 1920, mudando-se para os Estados Unidos aos três anos de idade. Filho de um soldado americano e de uma alemã, ele teve uma infância conturbada.

Aliás, a infância teve muita influência em sua vida e obra, em especial pelos súbitos espancamentos que sofria, transformando-o em um “garoto gélido” (termo utilizado no livro “Notas de um Velho Safado”). Os livros de Bukowski representam um pouco de sua própria vida. A cidade de Los Angeles serve de inspiração para o escritor, que mostra o universo marginal americano, o “submundo”, saindo do modelo do “American way of life”.

Por meio de seus relatos, mostra aspectos da sociedade americana que muitas vezes são mascarados: como a utilização feminina do sexo para “subir na vida”, a venda do corpo para a obtenção de bens materiais. E ele não está falando das prostitutas, mas das legítimas “damas da sociedade”, e temáticas que estão em ampla discussão no período, como o feminismo, que por vezes ele busca deslegitimar, mostrando os embates nos aspectos macro e micro da sociedade.

O autor explicita sua concepção sobre o sujeito por meio das representações e das práticas sociais “exibidas” no texto. “É possível amar um ser humano?”, ele pergunta. Reflete sobre a vida vazia das pessoas, neste mundo onde nada faz sentido, onde as pessoas são egoístas e individualistas, e uma garrafa de uísque pode ser uma escapatória (não seria apenas uma fuga momentânea?). No caso de Bukowski, suas bebedeiras e confusões fizeram dele um dos escritores mais conhecidos no século 20.

É esse ambiente insalubre, sujo, repleto de prostitutas, drogas e marginais que encanta os leitores; alguns se identificam com os aspectos apresentados pelo autor, como a amortização da dor por meio do álcool, e outros são cativados por essa áurea de um mundo profano, onde nada é impossível, e o que é proibido também é realizado. “É claro [que é possível amar um ser humano], especialmente se você não os conhece muito bem”…

*Mislele Souza da Silva é graduanda em História pela Universidade Federal de Uberlândia e integrante do Núcleo de Estudos em História Social da Arte e da Cultura (Nehac). E-mail: mislele_lg@hotmail.com

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08/09/2012 às 09:33:39 - Atualizado em 09/09/2012 às 12:28:34

Em um universo povoado de bêbados, prostitutas e marginalizados, que o jornalista e escritor brasileiro João Antonio chama de merdunchos, Charles Bukowski (1920 – 1994) construiu a sua literatura. Bebendo do underground, não tardou para que as façanhas, em prosa e poesia, do Velho Safado fossem reconhecidas pelo seu valor, seja a estima literária, ou o resgate histórico de uma geração influenciada pelas liberdades pós-década de 1960.

E, embora o material disponível em português seja vasto, alguns poemas ainda permaneciam no limbo do ineditismo no Brasil. Tentando vencer essa barreira, o poeta e tradutor curitibano Fernando Koproski decidiu selecionar e traduzir mais de 40 poesias, que ainda não haviam recebido sua devida tradução, em uma coletânea, “Amor é tudo que dissemos que não era” (7 Letras), que acaba de chegar às livrarias.

Em tom confessional e desesperado, a obra bukowskiana emana mais que o singelo fazer literário, produzindo verdadeiros retratos do cotidiano, como em “Um poema é uma cidade”, “O homem no piano” ou “Paraíso bastardo”, que não poupam palavras para descrever a sordidez e o sentimento de inadequação ao status quo. É algo que Koproski define como “realismo desconcertante”.

Trabalhando desde 2008 no livro, o curitibano não esconde a importância da empreitada. “Houve, sobretudo, o critério de apresentar um panorama significativo dos livros inéditos de poesia do Bukowski em português, por meio de poemas representativos de seus diversos temas”, afirmou Koproski, que é também responsável por outra coletânea do Buk, “Essa loucura roubada que não desejo a ninguém a ser a mim mesmo amém” e por um retrospecto da obra poética do canadense Leonard Cohen, “Atrás das linhas inimigas de meu amor”.

 Antimanual

 Repleto de ironia e sarcasmo, “Amor é tudo o que dissemos que não era”, é na verdade, um antimanual de conduta, colocando lado a lado a realidade dos esquecidos e o falso academismo do sacrifício literário. Prova cabal disso, “Então você quer ser um escritor?” dá a deixa para iniciantes: “se você estiver fazendo isso por dinheiro ou/ fama,/não faça./se você estiver fazendo isso porque deseja/mulheres em sua cama,/não faça”.

 Dispensando as formalidades, Koproski conseguiu um resultado inigualável com a “prosa doida” do Velho, em uma simplicidade e ferocidade que a poética bukowskiana exige. “Ao contrário do que os teóricos da tradução pregam insistentemente, cada caso é um caso e deve ser estudado em separado”, disparou.

 Arrebanhando multidões, Bukowski deixou sua marca na literatura, que não raras vezes, é confundida com os beats, mas que, colocando de lado rótulos, ajudou a formar leitores e leituras em um mundo cada vez mais consumido pelo instantâneo e obsoleto.

Books & Review | Cole Garner HillUpdated: Aug 16, 2012 04:23 PM EDT

Today would have been author Charles Bukowski's 91st birthday. One of literature's dirtiest, crotchetiest old men, and damn proud of it, Bukowski died on this day in 1994 of Leukemia, shortly after completing his final novel, "Pulp."

If you've been to art school, taken a poetry class, or had an unusually disaffected adolescence, you're likely aware of his work. But even to the uninitiated, Bukowski's presence should still be recognizable. Much like William S. Burroughs, and Hunter S. Thompson, Bukowski's writing, and the man himself, has coalesced to such an extent with popular, and counter-culture, that it has been absorbed into the fabric of American consciousness.  His influence on art, music, writing, and our culture as a whole is undeniable.

Like Us on Facebook

Even if you're unaware of the embarrassment of riches hiding in Bukowski's collections of fiction and poetry, it's likely you've rubbed elbows somewhere along the way with his distinctive spit-fire spirit. His writing has been championed the world over by rock stars like Kurt Kobain, and celebrities like Johnny Depp, and was the subject of a documentary that featured Sean Penn, Tom Waits, Harry Dean Stanton,  and Bono  -- not to mention several film adaptations of his books, the most recent, 2005's "Factotum" starring Matt Dillon.

In honor of that cantankerous wisenheimer, read along below for some timeless Bukowski wisdom.

"Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must live."

"We have wasted History like a bunch of drunks shooting dice back in the men's crapper of the local bar."

"Pain doesn't make anything, nor does poverty. The artist is there first. What becomes of him depends upon his luck. If his luck is good (worldly-speaking) he becomes a bad artist. If his luck is bad, he becomes a good one."

"It was true that I didn't have much ambition, but there ought to be a place for people without ambition, I mean a better place than the one usually reserved. How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 6:30 a.m. by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?"

"An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way. An artist says a hard thing in a simple way."

"if I suffer at this

typewriter
think how I'd feel
among the lettuce-
pickers of Salinas?

I think of the men
I've known in
factories
with no way to
get out -
choking while living
choking while laughing
at Bob Hope or Lucille
Ball while
2 or 3 children beat
tennis balls against
the walls.

some suicides are never
recorded."

"Death, at last, is a bore - no more than pulling a shade. we do not die all at once, generally, but piece by piece, little by little. the young die hardest and live hardest and understand nothing. but they are the most generous and the truest and better fit to lead than the cautious wise."

Did we forget your favorite? Let us know in the comments?

Yesterday was Michael Montfort's birthday. So, I thought, I'll share a little letter with you, that started his friendship with Bukowski:

In 1977 he got the job to photograph Bukowski for the German 'Rogner's Magazin'. Attached is the letter, where they offer him this job in the first place. Sorry, it's in German language, but that's what it is. I thought you might be interested in it as a document anyway:

I agree. Buk looks fairly young in the little snapshot.

You think so?
It looks more like an early seventies picture to me.
Taken by Brad Darby or so...

I just went back to the site where I found the snapshot.
http://ldanz.blogspot.com/

Losing things happens all the time. For years I could not put my finger on where I had stored my collection of letters from the writer and poet Charles Bukowski. It was the fall of 1972 when I reached San Francisco in my cross-country escape and I went directly to City Lights bookstore. Whatever I could afford I took down from the shelves, poets who were new to me especially. Among them was a collection of poems by Bukowski: The Days Run Away Like Horses Over the Hills, published by Black Sparrow Press in 1969. My driving companion and I took turns reading the poems aloud as we made our way back to New York bolstered by bottles of Henry McKenna and white tablets with little crosses engraved on them that made you feel very, shall we say, awake. I found a few more of Bukowski’s books in New York but had to hunt for them. I wrote to him care of the publisher, John Martin and only signed with my last name. I think I had already had a good sense of the volatile chemical reaction he’d had with women. He wrote back with a post office box return. I wrote, revealing my full name and he wrote again, finally including his home address on Carleton Way in Los Angeles.

We continued our written correspondence for a little over a year and my collection of more than 50 letters from him was passed around at many wild and drunken evenings in my apartment for the artists and writers and weirdoes who passed through my life. To my mind, I thought I had, at some point, recognized their value and stashed the letters away somewhere safe because I did have copies of the letters. But periodic searches in the apartment revealed no trace of them. At least I still had the copies. I resigned myself to their loss.

After I left, or rather lost my job in the corporate world I saw the field becoming rockier and rockier (re: younger and younger) and then impossible to navigate. I thought about how I could earn money quickly. I knew a woman of a certain age…er…mine, someone who also fancies herself a writer and had, like me, been unceremoniously dumped from magazine publishing. She had entertained the notion of becoming a dominatrix and she once gifted me with a tightly braided leather whip that so freaked me out I never brought up the subject again. The Mister was never on board with the idea anyway.

One night I recalled a line from one of Buk’s letters, about how I should never give up my art; if times got tough his letters might bring cash someday. I was determined to find those letters. The Mister and I pulled out every drawer, emptied every closet, and dug through piles of photos and papers stashed into suitcases. Spent and disappointed I was just about to give in when a basket full of letters from my friend Rauda, a writer in Paris, kind of glowed from under the little desk in the front room. I reached into the lot of them and plucked out a letter from Bukowski, mixed in with her correspondence. I had found the very one I was looking for, the bulk of the collection, in fact. A few of them sold quite well and got us across a financial crevasse.

Lou tells the story about meeting Bukowski at the station and picking him up the first time sight unseen, "he was the drunk guy staggerring around the columns at the station."

New to the forum.

Know this has nothing to do with placing Bob Dylan in Gypsy Lou's vicinity in NOLA, tho I found the recollection in the quote above very interesting. Are there other recollections/observations of Buk during his time with the Webbs, or between '56-'66/when he became more well-known? (That is, outside of published work in chapbooks, etc., which is, yes, voluminous. I know I'm opening myself up for criticism here for not allowing the work to speak for the man, but there is always room complement the myth with interesting observations by worthwhile, outside parties.)

No, I'm not only asking for drunk stories, though the quote above might seem to imply that. (I also don't discourage them, though.)

For me, this seems to be an under-documented time of his life and the Sounes biography plays a little too loose with it for me. As does the documentary, BIT. I've done a good amount of research, and I've read the great majority of Buk's stuff, but there's something missing here, even though it was such a rich (and/or fraught) time for Buk the person.

It seems to me that this is the most dense time in Bukowski's life. In this span (roughly), he loses father/mother, JANE, makes regular clerk at the PO, FrancEyE, Barbara, busts gut, has Marina, and publishes with the Webbs. And about another 100 significant things...

I might be missing an obvious source, but, if so, please pass it on. Otherwise, I'm pretty curious.

What was this time? Here he's experimenting with his writing like at no other time in his life, and is more productive than any other poet on earth. There are details and flashes of who this strange person was then, but only in small amounts. Does anyone else see this as a problem?

Anyway, I'll take any help I can. This post is long enough as is.

Hadn't seen it either. Interesting.

But what's the other shit? The tooth and the snake with the mouse, wtf?

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A waitress has got no place else to go. She’ll listen to you, whatever lame joke, lame compliment. She’s waiting for your order, doesn’t know what you’re going to say, she’s got to be there. That’s part of the beauty of it. Nine times out of ten, only reason she’s free to be nice to you is because it’s her job. If it wasn’t her job she couldn’t do it. Her husband wouldn’t let her. It wouldn’t be appropriate. That’s why no other woman will do.

A waitress is always your chance to talk to another human soul, a woman’s, however brief. She’ll hear it. That’s enough. Maybe she liked it. Maybe she liked you.
And of course, maybe she didn’t like you. That’s ok. She doesn’t have to like you. She doesn’t have to be nice. She doesn’t owe you anything. She’s not your girlfriend. There’s a certain guy goes into a diner and thinks the girl in the dress is in love with him. I’ve got nothing to say about guys like that. That’s not what I’m talking about here. That’s a different thing. It’s sad but it’s a different sad. And it can be uncomfortable for the waitress because maybe she’s got a man. She’s not hustling, she’s just smiling when she gives you your coffee. A waitress doesn’t want a guy to get the wrong idea.
No matter how nice a waitress and how much you think you need her, you’ve got to remember your place, who you are, and who she is. Waits wrote about it on Small Change, track six,

“Invitation to the Blues”.
“Well she’s up against the register with an apron and a spatula,
Yesterday’s deliveries, tickets for the bachelors
She’s a moving violation from her conk down to her shoes,
Well, it’s just an invitation to the blues.”

You watch a waitress and a customer, you’re watching life. And all life’s got rules. You play by the rules, don’t overstep, and don’t let your mind run away, you’ll do just fine with waitresses, and the cup of coffee they serve is better than a cup of gold. But you let your mind run you’re just asking for blues.
And no waitress wants to be an invitation to the blues. They don’t want to torment a man so lonely he’s getting designs on the first woman he’s spoken to all day.
But you know, even when that happens, who’s to say it’s so bad? A guy gets the wrong idea once in a while, but if that waitress’s smile is the best thing he’s seen all day, the only smile he got, well thank god she was there. There are worse things than the blues.

The tie between the lonely soul and the waitress runs deeper than smiles. Waits had no problem with an unfriendly waitress. On track five of Small Change, “The Piano has been Drinking (Not Me)”, the waitress doesn’t smile. Song says,
“you can’t find your waitress with a Geiger counter
And she hates you and your friends and you just can’t get served without her.”
She doesn’t love him, she’s at work, but she’s still his waitress.

Waitresses are good for art, and for some art they’re crucial. The reason waitresses don’t kill the art they inspire, like some other women, is because no matter how nice they are, they never really cure the loneliness. They can’t, and thank god. Sometimes they ease it. That’s what has you coming in every night. Even a mean waitress eases loneliness. But they also prolong it. And the prettier the waitress the further she invites you into the blues. And that’s the invitation feeds good music and poetry.

America, beat art, Waits songs and Bukowski poems are all populated by men on the road. Drifter men with homeless minds. They don’t have a woman to go home to. They don’t want one. They don’t know what they want. And anyway they can’t find it. There’s a searching, a yearning, and there are a lot of greyhound buses and railway boxcars. Here’s an excerpt from Bukowski’s poem, “where was I?” from his collection, Sifting Through the Madness for the Word, the Line, the Way.

I always seemed to be
on a cross-country
bus
traveling
somewhere.
looking out a dirty
window at
nothing at
all.
I always knew exactly how much
money I was
carrying.
for example:
a five and two ones
in my wallet
and a nickel, a dime and
two pennies in my right
front pocket.
I had no desire to speak
to anybody nor to be
spoken to.

I don’t know what it is keeps these men moving. It’s a by-product of their loneliness but also a cause. And it wouldn’t survive without waitresses. They wouldn’t. The men. The men of Bukowski poems, the Henry Chinaskis of a thousand small towns, stumbling from bar to bar, wouldn’t last without waitresses. The men in Waits’ songs, curious and varied, would perish. Without waitresses the world would be too cruel for them, they would die, the art they inspire would die, and the world would lose something beautiful.

I don’t know what it is that waitresses have, especially the old fat ones and the ones that hate you, but they have something, every one of them. It’s undeniable. All the late night diners of the world are full of men and cigarette smoke and day old newspapers, and they’re irrefutable proof of something important. Think about it. What are those men there for? Some of them are on a shift, killing time, waiting, would rather be at home in bed, but some of them, the ones we’re interested in, couldn’t be anywhere else. They’ve got no place else to go and even if they had they wouldn’t be there.
“Gypsy hacks and insomniacs”, that’s what Waits calls them in “Eggs & Sausage (In a Cadillac With Susan Michelson)”, track six on Nighthawks at the Diner. Here’s an album devoted almost entirely to those men and those waitresses, keeping watch while the rest of the world sleeps. An entire album exploring that feeling, that place, the diner late at night and the coffee and cigarettes and waitresses, the men in there looking for something nameless. He describes the waitress in verse two of “Eggs & Sausage”.

“In a graveyard charade, a late shift masquerade
2 for a quarter, dime for a dance
with Woolworth rhinestone diamond
earrings, and a sideway’s glance
now the register rings
and now the waitress sings.”

Who knows what has those places full so late? You don’t see too many women in there. And what would happen to them, those men, and the poetry and music, without the waitresses?
There’s one last poem by Bukowski I want to finish with. It’s not necessarily about a waitress or about the loneliness, but they’re in there. They have to be. The poem was recorded by Waits in 2006 on Orphans (Bastards), track eleven. It shows they were on the same page. Maybe it even has an answer.

Nirvana

Not much chance, completely cut loose from purpose,
He was a young man riding a bus through North Carolina on the way to
somewhere.
And it began to snow.
And the bus stopped at a little café in the hills and the passengers entered.
And he sat at the counter with the others, and he ordered, the food arrived.
And the meal was particularly good.
And the coffee.
The waitress was unlike the women he had known.
She was unaffected, and there was a natural humor which came from her.
And the fry cook said crazy things.
And the dishwasher in back laughed a good clean pleasant laugh.
And the young man watched the snow through the window.
And he wanted to stay in that café forever.
The curious feeling swam through him that everything was beautiful there.
And it would always stay beautiful there.
And then the bus driver told the passengers that it was time to board.
And the young man thought: “I’ll just stay here, I’ll just stay here.”
And then he rose and he followed the others into the bus.
He found his seat and looked at the café through the window.
And then the bus moved off, down a curve, downward, out of the hills.
And the young man looked straight forward.
And he heard the other passengers speaking of other things,
or they were reading or trying to sleep.
And they hadn’t noticed the magic.
And the young man put his head to one side,
closed his eyes, and pretended to sleep.
There was nothing else to do,
just listen to the sound of the engine,
and the sound of the tires
in the snow.

http://www.beatdom.com/?p=966

....From Notes, "Kerouac had set him up for the sucker punch and Neal had bit, kept biting. but you know Neal was o.k. and another way of looking at it, Jack had only written the book, he wasn't Neal's mother. just his destructor, deliberate or otherwise" (24).

Thanks for posting this quote. I remember the Notes column very well, and remember feeling that Bukowski felt strongly that Kerouac had glorified Neal in a way that Neal could never possibly live up to. It was a huge monkey on his back and it probably helped destroy him... Kerouac did him no favor. The irony of that column (originally written for Open City or the L.A Free Press in the late 60s, I do believe) is that although Bukowski was never a Beat writer, it was HE who ended up writing the best and most realistic tribute that Neal could ever have - that Neal was an okay guy - rather than the tribute having come from one of the Beat writers right after Neal died. And that's about the only connection that Bukowski had with the Beats that I can see - writing briefly about one of their heroes.

As for the Kerouac's writings, I'm sure Bukowski read something of it or he wouldn't have had such strong feelings about how Kerouac had portrayed Neal. I hope so, because On the Road and Dharma Bums are beautifully written, inspiring and flowing works of art. They had considerable influence at the time, turning Kerouac into a cultural icon, and they are particularly great reading when one is young. ("Hit the road! Life is an adventure! Enjoy the moment! Spontaneous sex is okay!")

The problem is that Kerouac didn't seem to be able to live up to the freedom of spirit he wrote about when young in his later life, and died a truly pitiful alcoholic in his mid-40s, reverting back to his Catholic roots rather than his Zen philosophy, a man who appeared to be completely sentimentally attached and emotionally dependent on his mother. So much of what Kerouac wrote wasn't somehow real, perhaps in the same way that his portrait of Neal in On the Road wasn't real, and Bukowski finally set the record straight. He was one of the few people who saw what Neal was beyond Kerouac's glorified image of this essentially blue-collar guy. Yes, there's a beautiful irony in there somewhere that the gods had Bukowski step in for the final word. The Notes column was heartfelt and that's what made it memorable.

Hunter S. Thompson certainly dropped a dose or four on top of a dozen whip-its and an 8-ball in the furthest stall from the men's room door at ole King Eddy's. Of that we can be fairly confident.

As for the bar thing, I agree - we have many stories of bar days, and most of them seem to be in Philly, NO, on the work trains and buses, etc. LA was his home turf, and there were apartments and shack-jobs to drink with. The bars in LA seem like a minor event given all that's been written. I would like to know what bar Buk is leaving on the cover of Life & Death in the Charity Ward, however.

Great story, told with tact and no small dose of humor considering the subject matter. The book is a UK release for those who don't know, but the stories are all in EEEAGTOOM and/or the reissues from City Lights.

Hi all, Bukowski newby just starting to really dig in. I come at this as an aspiring writer and there is something that nobody has really touched on and it's just pure speculation on my part as to how this pertains to Mr. Bukowski.

Writing (or any kind of creative process) for some people is dependent on "opening up the flow" and tapping into the subconscious. That can be really hard to do for some people with music playing that demands attention and constantly breaks into one's thoughts. Music with words can often tend to seep into one's writing, sometimes in subliminal ways or sometimes obvious. Pop music jars and involves, and to some that is good but to some it isn't. I've found that the noisier genres of jazz does this also, and have personally found I work purest with almost ambient music or classical playing, better than with nothing playing. It can act as a focusing lens, like sonic wallpaper, that lets a person get into the creative zone. Maybe he just found something that focused him.

It seems he liked classical whether creating or not so maybe this invalidates my whole line of thought but this all just occurs to me because I like jarring noisy music 90% of the time but during the times I am trying to write or create it is always classical or something else that I can just kind of soak up without it breaking into my flow. Like I said I'm fairly new to the Bukowski world and have no idea if this has any relationship to his reality at all, but the thoughts occurred to me in an insistent enough manner as a remote possibility that they made a lurker sign up for an account! Cheers all.

P.S. I live in Minneapolis and am friends with people in the building where Factotum had it's "bike shop" segments filmed in. The building is actually anchored by a bike shop called One on One Bikes and it was years and years between when the movie was shot and when it finally came out. Matt Dillon visited the bike shop a few times and apparently was quite the friendly and "normal" dude, no pretense or star trip.

You might want to read those authors whom Bukowski most admired (and many of whom are my favorites as well):

Ernest Hemingway (specifically his early short stories)
Louis Ferdinand Celine (specifically _Journey_--I don't think Bukowski liked much of his later work, although I do)
John Fante (specifically those novels "starring" Arturo Bandini)
Knut Hamsun (specifically _Hunger_; incidently, Knut is my favorite writer of fiction)
Fyodor Dostoevsky (as has been said by men wiser than myself, in _Notes From Underground_ one can "hear the voice of blood")
D.H. Lawrence

As for poets, I guess Ezra Pound ranks near the top, as does Robinson Jeffers.

Though I doubt Bukowski was familiar with him, some of my favorite writings are the "autobiographical fiction" of August Strindberg (_Inferno_, _Alone_, _Son of a Servant_, etc.)

From the Bad Mags facebook page. I know I have a few of these oi mags with the S. Clay Wilson artwork.

Right now the only thing I can add to the archive is that The Misunderstanding Universe made it into Betting on the Muse as The Unaccommodating Universe with some changes beyond the title.

Just the "splash page" (correct technical term?), not the whole thing. Such is the nature of facebook.

AppId is over the quota

Cleaning out the print shop and 'found' the following Bukowski items; prices, as always, are negotiable.

BUKOWSKI, Charles. AS BUDDHA SMILES
Dover: Bottle of Smoke, 2003.

First edition, set of 20 poem cards, 2.5" x 3.5", printed in various types, on various colored cards, on an antique Kelsey 5 x 8 press, number 55 of 74. Fine, as new, in publisher's clear plastic box.

$45 (includes shipping in US) [one copy on ABE: $83]

BUKOWSKI, Charles. BURNING IN WATER DROWNING IN FLAME
Santa Rosa: Black Sparrow Press, 1988.

Fourteenth printing, 232 pages, paperback bound in cloth covered boards (for library?). Introduction by Bukowski. Covers a bit sunned, stained, internally clean. Solid reading copy

$3 ($3 shipping in the US)

BUKOWSKI, Charles. BURNING IN WATER DROWNING IN FLAME
Santa Rosa: Black Sparrow Press, 1974.

First edition (color title page), 232 pages, paperback bound in cloth covered boards, library pocket and stcker inside back cover from State University of New York. Introduction by Bukowski. Covers lightly worn, otherwise internally clean. Solid reading copy

$5 ($3 shipping in the US)

BUKOWSKI, Charles. ROLL THE DICE
San Francisco: Abandoned Planet Bookstore, 2000

First Edition, poster, 16.75" x 21.75", printed in two colors, photograph by Michael Montfort. Bukowski poem: ROLL THE DICE (collected in WHAT MATTERS MOST..., 1999). Good condition, folded as issued

$5 (includes shipping in US)

BLACK SPARROW PRESS - NEW TITLES

1) Spring/Summer 1992
BUKOWSKI, Charles. THE LAST NIGHT OF THE EARTH POEMS [includes excerpt]

2) Spring/Summer 1999
BUKOWSKI, Charles. REACH FOR THE SUN
KRUMHANSL, Aaron. A DESCRIPTIVE BIBLIOGRAPHY...

3) Fall/Winter 2000
BUKOWSKI, Charles. OPEN ALL NIGHT [includes excerpt]

$5 for the lot (includes shipping in US)

AppId is over the quota

....From Notes, "Kerouac had set him up for the sucker punch and Neal had bit, kept biting. but you know Neal was o.k. and another way of looking at it, Jack had only written the book, he wasn't Neal's mother. just his destructor, deliberate or otherwise" (24).

Thanks for posting this quote. I remember the Notes column very well, and remember feeling that Bukowski felt strongly that Kerouac had glorified Neal in a way that Neal could never possibly live up to. It was a huge monkey on his back and it probably helped destroy him... Kerouac did him no favor. The irony of that column (originally written for Open City or the L.A Free Press in the late 60s, I do believe) is that although Bukowski was never a Beat writer, it was HE who ended up writing the best and most realistic tribute that Neal could ever have - that Neal was an okay guy - rather than the tribute having come from one of the Beat writers right after Neal died. And that's about the only connection that Bukowski had with the Beats that I can see - writing briefly about one of their heroes.

As for the Kerouac's writings, I'm sure Bukowski read something of it or he wouldn't have had such strong feelings about how Kerouac had portrayed Neal. I hope so, because On the Road and Dharma Bums are beautifully written, inspiring and flowing works of art. They had considerable influence at the time, turning Kerouac into a cultural icon, and they are particularly great reading when one is young. ("Hit the road! Life is an adventure! Enjoy the moment! Spontaneous sex is okay!")

The problem is that Kerouac didn't seem to be able to live up to the freedom of spirit he wrote about when young in his later life, and died a truly pitiful alcoholic in his mid-40s, reverting back to his Catholic roots rather than his Zen philosophy, a man who appeared to be completely sentimentally attached and emotionally dependent on his mother. So much of what Kerouac wrote wasn't somehow real, perhaps in the same way that his portrait of Neal in On the Road wasn't real, and Bukowski finally set the record straight. He was one of the few people who saw what Neal was beyond Kerouac's glorified image of this essentially blue-collar guy. Yes, there's a beautiful irony in there somewhere that the gods had Bukowski step in for the final word. The Notes column was heartfelt and that's what made it memorable.

SURVIVING BUKOWSKI: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ANN MENEBROKER AND CHARLES BUKOWSKI - Wow, $80 for this? It has to be the most dry and lifeless (and brief) I-knew-Bukowski memoir I've ever read.

Funny though, there are a lot of Bukowski letters in there. Maybe this one slipped under Martin's radar. That or Menebroker told him to go screw when he threatened her over it (I'm not saying he did that, just his M.O.).