Alcoholism - why didn't it destroy Bukowski? (1 Viewer)

I have looked in on this thread with amusement. I beleive that alcoholism to be a self diagnosed malady and I have yet to read anything Hank wrote where he stated he had this "condition".
As far as demon rum destroying Bukowski,it may have significantly shortened his stay among the living but his legacy has lived on, with vigor.
 
I have looked in on this thread with amusement. I beleive that alcoholism to be a self diagnosed malady and I have yet to read anything Hank wrote where he stated he had this "condition".
As far as demon rum destroying Bukowski,it may have significantly shortened his stay among the living but his legacy has lived on, with vigor.
Well, you're certainly keeping the humour going anyway.
 
Didn't Bukowski say that alcohol saved him from committing suicide while living in the 'slums' (he used this word)?
Beer and wine extended his life! ;) Cheers!
 
In Glasgow? You're kidding, right? :D

I'm not kidding. Glasgow has a horrific alcohol problem. Many of my family have serious alcohol problems, it's ruined their lives, they've ruined other peoples. Sometimes I think people read Bukowski and think he is advocating drinking all the time and lots of people do it; they think it's cool or shows that you're a man, and real tough motherfucker, but honestly, once you've seen one drunk prick, you've seen them all. But then again, how many of them are sitting writing, trying to assimilate some of the demons onto the page? Answer: Not many.

Interestin to read responses though, lot of good answers and suggestions, but this idea that if you don't drink like a ranging alcoholc you're some time of lesser human being is puuure delusion. Bukowski did write to show anyone how to live, but many people read his books and try to live as he did, and think that being a complete drunk is some kind of reward in itself, that it shows your alpha-male, be damned with the world attitude.

Yet, addiction can be sooo fucked up, families mauled by it; you go into the social work department in Glasgow and you'll find all sorts of alcoholics, desperate to break free from the demon drink. And it's not a sign of weakness, these people have endured a lot of hardship, and they're not sitting their saying - 'drink is cool' 'it's the way foward', 'it shows you're a man'. Like mjp said, a lot of heavy drinks, have an immaturity they can't surpass, they literally can't proces life 'beyond' the demon drink.

It's a rare few that catalogue their lives with it; most of them are shunned by society, piss and shit themselves, wear the same clothes until they are rigid with dirt and grime. It blows my mind how fucked up the drink can make people.
 
Although Cardiff is in Wales and Olaf is talking about Glasgow, Scotland - I'd say that you'll see that sort of thing in many UK town and city centres on an average weekend.
 
Although Cardiff is in Wales and Olaf is talking about Glasgow, Scotland - I'd say that you'll see that sort of thing in many UK town and city centres on an average weekend.

Yes, sorry for being inaccurrate.
I made my first major drinking experience in Torquay, England. The son of the host family took the other german guy and me to the local pub with his friend. It was a kind of cheerful drinking battle England vs. Germany which I lost. Those two were visiting the pub every night during that time and New Castle Brown Ale isn't really a beer for beginners ;)
(To be honest I had to vomit outside, but it's not unromantic to vomit while bending over an acient looking wall in the moonlight, if it doesn't become a habit.)
 
Everyone seems to be forgetting culture... possibly if you're from somewhere like Glasgow (and I have a good friend from there, heavy drinker, too) you're not considered an "alcoholic", you're just drunk like everybody else everyday. Perhaps "alcoholic" is an Americanized mental-complex. The people on the AA forums respond to this question, "how do I know I'm an alcoholic?" with, "when you say you're an alcoholic."
 
"Alcoholism is a disease, but it's the only one you can get yelled at for having. Goddamn it Otto, you are an alcoholic. Goddamn it Otto, you have Lupis... one of those two doesn't sound right." --Mitch Hedberg
 
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Anyway , it is amazing that someone who drinks heavily for decades
can reach age of 74 , like Bukowski did it.
Plus , he didn't care about healthy diet or exercises
and he was smoker, so it is realy miracle how he survived so long.

Does anyone knows how old were his parents when they died?
 
Everyone seems to be forgetting culture... possibly if you're from somewhere like Glasgow (and I have a good friend from there, heavy drinker, too) you're not considered an "alcoholic", you're just drunk like everybody else everyday. Perhaps "alcoholic" is an Americanized mental-complex. The people on the AA forums respond to this question, "how do I know I'm an alcoholic?" with, "when you say you're an alcoholic."

Precisely, very well put.
 
Did I tell you that I threw up five times the next morning after I enthusiastically posted I'd been drinking my second beer after two years of boring soberness?

I just can't do it anymore. It was only three cans of beer (one and a half litre), but the next day I was sick. So the time is gone. I've had enough drinks. Body proven.

Sick, yes it felt like a disease had taken over me; perhaps that's why some call alcoholism a disease, I don't know. Well, certainly not because of me.
 
ever read post office?
Yes, for the book club.
At last you posted ; I thought you won't appear anymore.

Although Cardiff is in Wales and Olaf is talking about Glasgow, Scotland - I'd say that you'll see that sort of thing in many UK town and city centres on an average weekend.
Here in Paris a prevention campaign against the specific problem of binge drinking has just been launched. In the news, they keep illustrating this phenomenon by showing reports set in UK.
My former best friends told me what she saw in the streets every time she went out by night during the weekends when she was staying in London. What I found the most startling were the girls she described : totally bedraggled, some semi-naked, lying on the ground, some even publicly pissing, etc.
 
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The UK problem stems also from the availability of alcohol, and the lack of limits and restrictions. Booze is very cheap, especially in Supermarkets, if you want a crate of beer, a couple of bottles of cheap wine and a small bottle of vodka then it will set you back not much more then twenty quid.

The Bars and Pubs need to compete with the shop prices (Pubs are closing at an alarming rate) so they offer deals, such as all you can drink for £15.

In many ways the UK is a haven for alcoholics.
 
Buk No Alcoholic

Great thread.

Buk was a functioning drunk! He self medicated and it saved him, inspired him, fed him. As a young man it must have really helped after his upbringing with that cun* of an old man....

In the UK there has always been a drinking culture. The restriction on too much drinking in the past were, cost and work! Many heavy drinkers worked in the old industries, ship building, Coal mining, Construction, the Steel industry, Iron Foundrys... but many other jobs like the Post, Painting & decorating, journalism priniting...etc Their drinking revolved or was controlled by their work regime...Many only drank at weekends, but binged from Friday Afternoon all day Saturday and Sunday.

I believe Buk worked nights at the post office and drank when he got home in the morning? I think Buk took more outta Alcohol then it ever took otta him!
Alcohol cost him some relationships...Lynda?

And Buk was tough, though he did mellow in the end.
 
Sometimes when my 'ordinary madness' gets a bit much, a bottle of wine levels things, and I smile again.
I always see two sides to Bukowski when he talks about his drinking, there is the romantic 'me against the world' writer peering out onto the street with a glass in hand, two fingers to the world; and then there is the loner, alienated against the world, staring at the shit in the bowl, gasping for air, but seeing that bottle as much of a necessity as that air he's gasping for.

They say your mortality is all in your genes anyway, so maybe Buk's genes were more hard wearing Lee Coopers than trendy wear at the knee Levis. Maybe in some irony his fathers genetic code was what kept the old mule going. Who knows.

Anyway, gotta run, there's three bottles of Merlot for a tenner at the local offie.....
 
I'm not kidding. Glasgow has a horrific alcohol problem...
You took my post too seriously Olaf. It was just a tongue-in-cheek reference to the way in which alcohol (and the abuse of it) is an everyday thing in Glasgow but at the same time it's not really always viewed as a problem because it's such a 'way of life'. I suppose you couldn't have realised that though. I'm from Newcastle so I know exactly what you're talking about regarding macho attitudes towards it, etc.
 
Well, that`s very easy. Most professional alcoholics that survive got at least one thing in their lives that`s even more important to them as drinkng. In Buks case it was writing, in Lemmys case it was music, in Richard Burtons acting and so on. Lose the only thing in life that matters to you and you are fuckin`gone.
 
Don't think its that simple. If Buk loved writing so much, why the "ten year drunk"? He stopped writing to focus on drinking full time. Although he did appear sporadically during that time, he had almost entirely stopped writing?
 
Uh, i'm just pulling this out of my butt here, but I from what I remember his "10 year drunk" was really only about 2 years, and he didn't stop writing, he simply wrote much less than usual. If my memory is correct, this happened when Jane died.
 
What's a cun*? I can't keep up with British slang. Your Mersey beat and your lorries. It's like Chinese.

I think he means 'cunt'. But I don't think Buk's old man was a complete cunt, maybe half a cunt. After all, he did give Buk blood credits at the charity hospital when he was haemorrhaging to death. A complete cunt of a father would've just let Buk die.
 
There seems to be many definitions of what an alcoholic is. Take your pick.
To some its anybody who likes to get drunk. To others its not being able to stop once you start.
Then there's having to stop and not being able to.
You're an alcoholic, " if you say so"...
 

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