Continuing my Buk collection (1 Viewer)

Hi, not a particularly exciting thread but I have some gift money from xmas, and I thought instead of letting it go on booze, food or rent i'd re-kick my Bukowski collection (haven't bought anything for a while now).

So far I have:

Burning in Water...
War All The Time
The Days Run Away...
Ham on Rye
Factotum
Post Office
Women
South of No North
The Most Beautiful Woman in Town
Screams from the Balcony

I have enough for two books, so I thought I would see if people could offer any recomendations?

Thanks.
 
I would chose a good biography, such as the Howard Sounes' one, and a fat book of poetry such as The Last Night of the Earth Poems.
You'll end up buying them all, in time. ;)
 
Oops, forgot to mention that I have the Sounes book (as well as Roominghouse Madrigals - just remembered now!). I'll look around for The Last Night of The Earth Poems - I quite liked the later/mid era poems in War All The Time.
How about short story collections? I think i'll get a book of poems & short stories this time.
 
You have 'The most beautiful woman' so perhaps the companion book 'Tales of Ordinary Madness' would be a good purchase. 'Hot Water Music' is worth considering too if you like his short stories.

'Septuagenarian Stew' has a mix of poems and a few stories, as does 'Betting On The Muse'. Stew would be a good buy.

Otherwise, I'd suggest the novel 'Hollywood' or the journals 'The Captain Is Out to Lunch and the Sailors Have Taken Over the Ship'.
 
I always seem to fall back onto Pleasures of the Damned. It covers the years '51- '93, and even though it was recently published, still has some of his better older poems. But I may be biased since Dinosauria,We is included in it, which is one of my favs. Just stay away from newer ones like Slouching Towards Nirvana, and Bone Palace.
 
I'd second 'Tales of ordinary madness' for the same reason Hanksolo gave.
and I'd second 'You get so alone', since I think of his later poetry this is a masterpiece.
 
Yeah I've more or less settled on You Get So Alone but am still undecided about short story collection.
Personally I found The Most Beautiful Woman a bit hit or miss (making me lean to Hot Water Music over Tales of Ordinary Madness). Maybe I need to re-read The Most Beautiful Woman again but I seem to remember feeling that a lot of the stories lacked the power of South of No North, which was stuck in my mind long after reading it.

To be honest I know I will get it all eventually - so it doesn't matter too much - but bearing in mind I won't be getting any more for a while I want to make sure I get a nice mix to last me over the coming months.
 
All the stuff in The Most Beautiful Woman in Town and Tales of Ordinary Madness is uneven, because it all comes from Erections, Ejaculations, Exhibitions And General Tales Of Ordinary Madness, which is an uneven mess that seems to have been "edited" by throwing a bunch of weekly articles up in the air and sticking whichever ones landed face-up into the book.
 
I always seem to fall back onto Pleasures of the Damned. It covers the years '51- '93, and even though it was recently published, still has some of his better older poems. But I may be biased since Dinosauria,We is included in it, which is one of my favs. Just stay away from newer ones like Slouching Towards Nirvana, and Bone Palace.

Well, Pleasures of the Damned contains poems from Slouching and Bone Palace too. 114 of the 274 poems are in fact from posthumous poetry collections.
 
Very true Bukfan, didn't realize the number was that high. Now that I think about it a bunch in there were from What Matters Most.., which I always thought was one of the better posthumous collections.
 
Yes, the number is that high. I counted them. 114 posthumous poems is the same as 36.4% of the poems in the book. Too many, if you ask me, especially since many of them have been "edited" by Martin, or whoever did it. I would rather have seen some more poems from the non-posthumous collections instead.
I agree! I too, think What Matters Most... is one of the better, or best, posthumous collections.
 

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