275 steps from Hollywood (1 Viewer)

mjp

Founding member
From: At Terror Street and Agony Way (only appearance)

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nice, nice, very nice. just glad this site is here so I get to read things I'd never thought I'd lay my eyes on. thanks.
 
Wonder about the title. Did Buk live that close to Hollywood?
 
He wrote that when he lived at 5124 DeLongpre. If you look at a map, you can see that he was just more than a block from Hollywood Boulevard. Later, when he moved to Carlton Way he was even closer.

So he lived in Hollywood, but I suspect the Hollywood he's writing about is Hollywood Boulevard.

And for those of you who have never visited, don't let the name "Hollywood" fool you. The city of Hollywood is a mixture of a little bit tourist area, a little bit upscale homes and condos and a whole lot of really poor neighborhoods. During the years Bukowski lived there, it was all poor neighborhoods. The rich didn't go anywhere near Hollywood proper, let alone live there, in the 70's.
 
The last time I got scabies was from a hotel room in Hollywood. circa 2005.

To further illustrate, how many movie stars would you imagine actually live in
Hollywood?

I'll bet there's not one I can think of off the top of my head.

Great poem, btw.
 
thanks... B doesn't name drop Donizetti very often.

He drops him in one of my favorite parts of one of my favorite stories: "Nut Ward Just East Of Hollywood"

"I tried to get into his place in the back there one night and here were all these cement people, all these big cement people just standing around outside there. Some of them were as high as twelve or fourteen feet. Huge breasts, pussies, cocks, balls, all about the place. I had just finished listening to The Elixir of Love by Donizetti. It didn't help. I still felt like some kind of pygmy in hell."

- Tales Of Ordinary Madness, p. 24
 
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I like the title too
OK heres a really stupid question. Has anyone tried to walk 275 steps from his previous home in any direction to imagine the inspiration of the title.

I read this and imagine him counting sidewalk slabs.
 
Mea Culpa
Can't you count drive by bodies and divide by 3 or something.

Our Polar Bears thank you for driving....hold on, you own them too, we sold them with our water rights.....
 
Carlton way and Western ave. is probably that many steps away from Hollywood Blvd...I've never counted, but I've walked the distance so many times over the years and it sounds about right.

...or, his apartment at 1623 Mariposa wasnt too far from Hollywood Blvd. either. About half a block or so, a real quick walk. Every building that he ever lived in is still a low-rent, grimy ass shithole.Even after all these years. It makes your soul feel good to see that. I'll bet that most of the people that live in his former dwellings have never even heard of the man. Lots of central-American immigrants, for the most part.

The post office that he wrote about in post office (the one where the Stone reined) is now a Korean Medical clinic of some sort...it was a temporary library location for the Wilshire branch library while it was undergoing repairs caused by an earthquake in 87, I used to always go there as a kid, of course I had no idea of who Bukowski was back then...I walk by there at least every 2 days on my way to the wilshire branch library, which is now back at it's original location a few blocks south/west of the 'post office'.
 
To further illustrate, how many movie stars would you imagine actually live in
Hollywood?
Not for nothing, but the last time I was house sitting(feeding cats and watering the lawn) for my friend who lives smack in the middle of the poorer side of Hollywood, Christopher Lloyd was across the street watering his lawn. Pretty cool guy.

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Great to have all these threads.
I was looking for 275 steps from Hollywood, but didn't know the title and the original text. It was one of the poems that Carl Weissner had chosen when he edited Gedichte die einer schrieb..., the breakthrough in Germany, as you know. Some of the poems from that book only appeared in little mags and have never been collected, so it's sometimes tricky to find them. Luckily we have the database.
 

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