Bukowski Observations for the Voting Booth (1 Viewer)

[CarversDog]

"... to lead the dead mass our so-called leaders have had to speak dead words and preach dead ways (and war is one of their ways) in order to be heard by dead minds. History, because it is built in this beehive fashion, has left us nothing but blood and torture and waste - even now after 2,000 years of semi-Christian culture the streets are full of drunks and poor and starving, the murderers and police and the crippled lonely, and the newly-born shoved right into the center of the remaining shit - Society."

"At this time there are too many people afraid for their jobs, there are too many people buying cars, TV sets, homes, educations on credit. Credit and the 8 hour day are great friends of the Establishment. If you must buy things, pay cash, and only buy things of value - no trinkets, no gimmicks. Everything you own must be able to fit inside one suitcase; then your mind might be free." (1970)

"There is a whole section of people down there (Alvarado Street) who live on air and hope and empty returnable bottles and the grace of their brothers and sisters. They live in small rooms, always behind in the rent, dreaming of the next bottle of wine, the next free drink in the bar. They starve, go mad, are murdered and mutilated. Until you live and drink among these you will never know the abandoned people of America. They are abandoned and they have abandoned themselves."

Vote wisely on November 5​

 

[bospress.net]

Vote wisely on November 5​

Or if you are a Democrat, vote on November 4th!

Bill

 

[CarversDog]

So that's why the polls were closed when I showed up on November 5th four years ago. Thanks, Bill.

 

[bospress.net]

Hi,
Yep, there will just be a bunch of School kids wondering why you are wandering around looking lost.

Bill

 

[roni]

great quotes Carver!
i wish i knew where to find them! source needed, baby!

 

[Gerard K H Love]

Those quotes prove the genius of Bukowski. He said something in 1970 that still holds water in 2008. By defining the very base of things he has given a timeless definition.
Thank you Rodger Dog.

 

[David]

Quotes are from "Portions from a Wine-Stained Notebook." Where else did you think they were from?;)

 

[CarversDog]

David is correct. The first quote is from "In Defense of a Certain Type of Poetry", the second quote is from the essay "Shall We Burn Uncle Sam's Ass?" (Notes From Underground, No, 3, 1970), and the last citation is from "The L.A. Scene", probably my favorite essay in the entire collection.

 

[roni]

thanks for the info!
looking forward to getting that book!

 

[LickTheStar]

An excellent reminder, indeed.

And yeah the L.A. Scene is flippin' brilliant. To think that basically none of that had seen the light of day in 10, 20, 30 years, or more is... mind blowing.

 

[Olaf]

Very Sharp observations from Bukowski.

Very relevant in our times, particularly with the credit crunch and the INSANE willingness of dry people to SPEND MONEY OBSSESSIVELY!

 

[vodka]

"At this time there are too many people afraid for their jobs, there are too many people buying cars, TV sets, homes, educations on credit. Credit and the 8 hour day are great friends of the Establishment. If you must buy things, pay cash, and only buy things of value - no trinkets, no gimmicks. Everything you own must be able to fit inside one suitcase; then your mind might be free." (1970)

yes.

 

[mjp]

..."The L.A. Scene", probably my favorite essay in the entire collection.

...the L.A. Scene is flippin' brilliant.

I seem to remember reading that "The L.A. Scene" in Portions is only an excerpt of a longer piece that ran under in the Los Angeles Free Press in 1972, in the "Notes of a Dirty Old Man" column...

 

[CarversDog]

That could very well be, MJP, but even in "Portions" it is a rather lengthy piece.

 

[mjp]

I found the reference. It's in the Acknowledgments section at the beginning of Portions. He calls it "sections" from a manuscript. So it could be that the LA Freep printed the same article that appears in Portions, but apparently a longer manuscript does exist.

 

[David]

Yes, the manuscript is longer. It's likely this happened more than once, that the original was abbreviated for the paper. In this case, the first few paragraphs were cut and also sections at the end.