Comparing Bukowski's fame to that of those who influenced him (1 Viewer)

[Garret]

I been pondering, for the last night or two, about how Bukowski's fame as a writer and poet compares to his influences. Here is my nifty little chart I made up, using "<" and ">" for indicate who's fame is bigger (or something like that):

Anton Chekhov > Bukowski
James Thurber < Bukowski
Franz Kafka > Bukowski
Knut Hamsun < Bukowski
Ernest Hemingway > Bukowski
John Fante < Bukowski
Louis-Ferdinand Céline ? Bukowski
Robinson Jeffers < Bukowski
Fyodor Dostoyevsky > Bukowski
D. H. Lawrence > Bukowski
Ezra Pound > Bukowski
Conrad Aiken < Bukowski
Sherwood Anderson > Bukowski
Catullus < Bukowski
Li Bai < Bukwoski

That's my speculation, folks. I still cant decided whether Buk's fame is bigger than Celine's though.

 

[Johannes]

Pretty good, I'd say.

I'd agree with everybody, maybe except Sherwood Anderson, but probably because he's not really well-known or that often mentioned in Europe.

 

[CarversDog]

Anderson greatly influenced Hemingway and Hemingway influenced Buk, as we know, so it's all a roundelay, really. For those who haven't read it, Winesburg, Ohio, is a terrific collection of interconnected short stories. One story in particular (I think it's called The Hands) made a huge impact on the creation of the character Homer Simpson in Nathanael West's The Day of the Locust.

 

[Hosh]

Pretty good stuff. Though I'd guess

Li Bai (Li Po) > Bukowski (& has been famous for centuries too--after all, we are talking a billion+ people...sheer numbers)

 

[Short Bus]

This was interesting list to read.
For me I found Celine through Buk so that gives Buk the nod.
Heres an addition perhaps for another thread poets larger than Buk-or American poets larger than Buk not better just better known.

 

[vodka]

so what was the scientific process you used to come to these conclusions?

 

[ROC]

The I-Ching?
Ouija board?

Well, whatever it was... I think you pretty much got it right.

 

[Garret]

so what was the scientific process you used to come to these conclusions?

A mix of tarot cards and darwinism...

Actually, this is just all my own speculation. I also kinda thought of who people would know more. Example: I could ask a person who they like more: Ernest Hemingway or Charles Bukowski. My guess is that they'll say Hemingway because 1) he's more mainstream, compared to 2) Bukowski, who is more of an "underground" author. Also, the impact on literature. While there has always been writings about Hemingway, Celine, Dostoyevsky, and others changing and impacting the world of literature, I honestly don't get that vibe off much from Bukowski (acourse, he changed and impacted MY view and opinions of literature, but thats just my tiny little world).

Oh yeah...Buk has been labeled one of the most imitated poets of our time, so Im in the wrong.

 

[vodka]

actually, i think Bukowski has had a large impact on literature as a whole.

all you have to do is pick up an issue of zygote and you can see an entire literary journal imitating a writer's style issue after issue.

i also think he opened up an endless debate regarding the definition of good poetry. Bukowski's name alone can create instant, angry debate among poets.

 

[harrystuped]

Buk is like Pringles, once you pop, you can't stop, I remember that the first time I read a poem from Bukowski, I felt like I just had to find out more, it was very uplifting.

 

[poptop]

Anderson greatly influenced Hemingway and Hemingway influenced Buk, as we know, so it's all a roundelay, really. For those who haven't read it, Winesburg, Ohio, is a terrific collection of interconnected short stories. One story in particular (I think it's called The Hands) made a huge impact on the creation of the character Homer Simpson in Nathanael West's The Day of the Locust.

Thanks for your post. I recall Henry Miller also being greatly enamored of Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio and he gifted the book as a romantic gesture to Mara (later Mona), the love of his life, in the beginning of his awesome novel, Sexus. It's no wonder that Sexus was banned along with Tropic of Cancer, Black Spring, and Tropic of Capricorn... Sexus, incidentally, was the first Miller book I ever read and I couldn't believe my eyes that any man on earth could talk about sex, art and love with the explosive candor and openness that Miller did and get away with it, get it into print. He was an amazing trailblazer of self-revelation and he left a 'scar' on the world that he said he would by writing about the falsity, the dark side of the American dream at least 25 years before another genius, Bukowski, did the same. The literary world didn't know what hit it... Miller also loved Anderson's The Triumph of the Egg, a charming tale that he could hardly get through without doubling over with laughter. (It can easily be found on-line through Google.) I'm ashamed to say that I've never read Winesburg, Ohio, but I loved that Miller loved it and I loved The Triumph of the Egg. Anyway, thanks again for your post.

Best wishes, Poptop

 

[vodka]

harrystuped, i agree.

i love when a writer, especially a poet, has such a large collection of works.

it's like heaven.

 

[poptop]

I been pondering, for the last night or two, about how Bukowski's fame as a writer and poet compares to his influences...

This is a fun question and I believe I understand where you're coming from. But for me, the question of the degree of fame for each writer with regard to Bukowski's, is of limited value.

I think a better question... immeasurable in quantitative terms... is... what have readers gained in human understanding by reading each one? Some of these writers mean little to me though they are famous, and I would have read Bukowski whether he was famous or not.

Many of these writers are considered more famous and significant than Bukowski because they are viewed as being part of mainstream literature. (I believe that is changing.)

Writers who simply have to write are not doing it for fame; they are doing it usually out of some form of imbecilic urge they have little control over and can only shape. In that context, fame could be viewed as a non-issue and is more a reflection of how these writers are perceived by the public than by the inherent worth of their works on individual readers.

What I do feel strongly about is that Bukowski's fame is increasing daily and his literary genius, his popularity can no longer be obstructed by the mainstream press or the sometimes narrow-minded academicians who think that they speak for everyone on what's acceptable or unacceptable to read - what's supposedly good or bad literature. That's why I don't much care for academic opinions.

For me, it's futile to compare great writers and their fluctuating degrees of fame when each of their lives reveal entirely different though sometimes similar truths. Jack London can tell a thrilling story like no other, and though I love Bukowski, I can't say that he's ever thrilled me in the same sense of the word as London. But I don't expect him to. Both are famous, but as much of a genius as Bukowski was, he wasn't the same kind of story teller - and it doesn't matter. Bukowski didn't write to thrill, in my view; he was interested in a quiet truth revealed and in finding truth in an exceedingly wide area of subjects and interests - the 90 percent of what truly happens to people in their daily lives that the other 99 percent of the great and famous writers never noticed or thought important enough to get down on paper. No one comes close to matching the expanse of his range. Perhaps that's why I've read more Bukowski than any of the others on this list and for me he's eclipsed them in his usefulness in my life. Nevertheless, many of these other writers have been able to leave an indelible impression as well, and even if they had been forgotten by the crowd, they would have remained immortals to me.

Best wishes, Poptop

 

[harrystuped]

harrystuped, i agree.

i love when a writer, especially a poet, has such a large collection of works.

it's like heaven.

I do agree, I have found lot's of artists by just exploring the tip of the iceberg, "bent" or "hot chip",

the things, you learn when you dare to do something different uh?

 

[MatG]

Okay ... I like this list ... Can we wager in which direction the arrows will point ten years from now? Pound may go the way of Thurber... Just sayin'

 

[Johannes]

Thanks for your post. I recall Henry Miller also being greatly enamored of Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio and he gifted the book as a romantic gesture to Mara (later Mona), the love of his life, in the beginning of his awesome novel, Sexus. It's no wonder that Sexus was banned along with Tropic of Cancer, Black Spring, and Tropic of Capricorn... Sexus, incidentally, was the first Miller book I ever read and I couldn't believe my eyes that any man on earth could talk about sex, art and love with the explosive candor and openness that Miller did and get away with it, get it into print. He was an amazing trailblazer of self-revelation and he left a 'scar' on the world that he said he would by writing about the falsity, the dark side of the American dream at least 25 years before another genius, Bukowski, did the same. The literary world didn't know what hit it... Miller also loved Anderson's The Triumph of the Egg, a charming tale that he could hardly get through without doubling over with laughter. (It can easily be found on-line through Google.) I'm ashamed to say that I've never read Winesburg, Ohio, but I loved that Miller loved it and I loved The Triumph of the Egg. Anyway, thanks again for your post.

Best wishes, Poptop

Not to let this drift off into a Henry-Miller-discussion, but I have to agree with that. When Henry Miller is on, he is hard to beat. At his best he seems to express a sort of somewhat eastern-touched-philosophy personalized in the "rich pauper", who, with an tremendous hunger of life, needs no goals in existence but a good 10-hours-sleep and some big breakfast afterwards to be somewhat pathologically happy through lifes worst tragedies. Or so it seems. I'm not saying this good.

But Miller fluctuates strongly. B's criticism always seemed true to me: Sometimes Miller is losing himself in space and the reader has no idea what's going on out there. And worse, the idea occurs, that he, Miller himself, does not know either. And then, the mystification of June Miller, as strong and fascinating as it may be in the beginning, somehow wears off as the novels go on. All the mystics about her hidden family and herself being maybe or maybe not or who knows a prostitute or something like that ... gna gna.

Sexus is like a rocket. It launches and detonates in the stratosphere. But Nexus and Plexus, though they of course contain masterly written passages, seem to have much lengths and "filling material". To me.

My favorite, though, always was "The Angel Is My Watermark".

 

[David]

I like his books of essays--"Stand Still Like the Hummingbird," "The Cosmological Eye," "Sunday After the War," "Wisdom of the Heart,"etc. ALSO A TERRIFIC LETTER WRITER--(like Buk). Also a cool little book of stuff Miller wrote for Irving Stettner's "Stroker" magazine called From Your Capricorn Friend.
Buk connections are multiple: both of German background, difficult family life, self-educated and very widely and well-read, both Dionysian. Both painted, both liked women. :)Two differences: Miller very into Eastern religion, mysticism, Theosophy. Buk was into the Tao but in his own very idiosyncratic way. Miller went all out: Gurdjieff, Blavatsky, books on William Blake (he loved Milton Perceval's book on Blake). Buk resisted transcendentalizing. Second difference, Miller drank little. Both geniuses.

 

[HarryC13]

Miller and Hemingway were huge influences on me and to me, as others here have pointed out, there are points where each of them resemble Bukowski. Hem's "A Clean Well-Lighted Place" is still one of the best things I ever read, and Miller's Tropics and "Big Sur and the Oranges of Hieronymus Bosch" are just great reading. So is that neglected piece of smut called "Under the Roofs of Paris," in which he shows off not only his dirty mind but a keen sense of humor.

 

[1fsh2fsh]

. So is that neglected piece of smut called "Under the Roofs of Paris," in which he shows off not only his dirty mind but a keen sense of humor.

Funny, I bought this book not knowing what it was , just one of the only Miller books I hadn't read. never even opened it. and then on the way home from the book store I picked up my son (a non-reader) from his work. when he picked it up from the seat of the car and started reading it, never putting it down for the fifteen mile ride home, I started having some hope that he might be taking an interest in some litrature. later that evening when I finally started reading it myself I realized exactly what it was that was keeping him so interested. man, some of the raunchyist (?) porn that I have ever read! Ha! well if that's what it takes to introduce him to a great writer so be it... we never discussed it, but I've always wondered what he thought of his dear old dads choices of reading material...

 

[HarryC13]

It's a great little piece of porn, but porn it is, complete with a chapter called "France in my pants." Stuff like that will hold anybody's interest ... and i agree, whatever it takes to show the lad how great fiction can be done, so be it. As long as Henry hasn't permanently scarred him, which I doubt ...

 

[CarversDog]

That's an absolutely delightful story, 1fsh. It reminds me of a lost moment from one of John Updike's Harry Angstrom novels, a moment between Harry and his son (except, well, Harry doesn't read but that's another matter)

 

[David]

Just thought I'd add that there's a controversy however whether Miller actually wrote those texts. Roger Jackson, who lives here in Ann Arbor and is Miller's bibliogapher, has looked into the matter and I believe he concluded that those texts are actually forgeries--written by someone else under Miller's name.

 

[HarryC13]

Wow, interesting, David! If Under the Roofs of Paris is a forgery, it's an incredible one, because whoever did that writing has Miller's style down COLD. Here's what it says on the back of my 1983 edition of the book:

"... this recently rediscovered work was written by Miller in 1941 for a Los Angeles bookseller who paid him a dollar per page."

Then there are comments from William S. Burroughs: "Vintage Miller! In terms of wit and audacity, it is probably his most successful work."
And one from Noel Young from Capra Press: "Indisputably Henry ... the use of language, the cadences, even the underlying zest and hilarity ..."

So wow, if it's a forgery, it has fooled better men than me! :D

 

[David]

Harry, I found the reference--I read this several years ago, but I thought the evidence was pretty compelling. See "Opus Pistorum and Henry Miller" in Henry Miller: A Bibliography of Primary Sources, Lawrence Shifreen and Roger Jackson, 1993 pp. 931-938. Jackson writes: "The publication of OP by Grove Press three years after Miller's death, was completed without any tangible evidence that Miller was indeed its author. Miller himelf...is in a significant way responsible for much of this confusion." Jackson provides a good deal of detective work to show how this confusion came about. I could scan and upload the article if you'd like to see it.