Actually, that "again" in the title is metaphoric. I haven't been here before (but haven't we all?), just that every Buk fan feels like he knows every other Buk fan. I think.
Just let me say "Bravo" to our founder MJP and all the great and hard work he's done exposing the chicanery of BSP/J.Martin. It's actually an amazing tale of American literary craziness and scandal. It should more widely be known by all literature lovers, notwithstanding their feelings about Buk.
I got turned on to him probably when I was 17, 18 and now I'm in my fifties (godang?!) It may have been Notes of A Dirty Old Man or Dancing In the Tournefortia--and I was hooked. Just ballsy and beautiful, gutsy and full of heart. As a writer myself what influenced me from Hank? His way with the line, the razor sharpness, the conciseness, the way his best poems are like movies in space and lift you off the ground. Or slug you in the gut--and then you say thank you.
I just found Abel Debritto's volumes, Essential Bukowski and Storm For the Living and Dead. Thank you Abel for all you've done for CB's legacy. I'm going through them now and it's been a while since I've really read his work. I just see the beauty, the grace, the pain, the struggle to be heard. And he was, boy was he heard.
When it comes to the Martin bowdlerization scandal I didn't know till later, maybe three years ago. But I recall picking up some of those books and feeling nonplussed--something definitely wasn't right--I chalked it up to greed and BS just putting out whatever scraps Buk left lying around in his ashtray. But it makes sense. One of the ironies I was contemplating tonight was that BS pushed Buk into the world, giving him the forum he might never have had (despite what MJP and others say) and then basically gutted his work later on. Strange. More than anything I'd say it was jealousy (and not just "prudery") that made him do that to his star writer. But who knows what would have happened without BS. He could have gone for years getting published by Graywolf, Copper Canyon, or whatever small press. His pals from New Orleans? The terrible irony is real and it is there.
One last idea(s): I think what led me to stop reading Buk for long periods is I started to see through the costume/mask and I got bored, frankly. My opinion--and I know many will oppose this--is that many of his books have TOO MANY poems in them. They just repeat and repeat--themes, ideas, even the same stories. The racetrack, the bars, the whores... Okay, got it. It's interesting that he was begging to have Martin put out more work but more of what? The same stories? How many more times did we need to hear about his writing development, getting rejected by magazines, living on skid row, his "women," etc. I mean it's interesting, even fascinating--for a while. But then, it flickers out. And there's a lot of this repetition in his work. So I pulled away. Got bored, basically. Also--and I know I'm going on, forgive me--we all know that much of his work turns on this personality thing--or "persona"--but the ego, after a while really overwhelms his work. Me, me, me. The myth of Bukowski, on and on. It's cloying and others have made such a critique--and it's a fair one.
Yet he's also great. His heights for me are Septuagenarian Stew and Betting On The Muse. (Thank god that one wasn't tampered with!!) I adore those books, filled both with verse and short fiction. Why do I like those? They're his most mature and his themes aren't so interlocked with his own mythologizing of "himself." He speaks more from/about his own real inner life. It's often breathtaking. And heartbreaking. That poem about the room where he recounts all the lonely people that slept there, the layers of gum stuck under the bed revealing their very lives and deaths. For me those two books have real treasures in them, the late Buk. Not that the earlier books don't. But I think a different editor could have helped. Not in the ugly and traitorous manner of unsanctioned revision; but someone who could have plucked out the needless repetitions. Doesn't ultimately matter. His best work will last.
Sorry this was so long.
Just let me say "Bravo" to our founder MJP and all the great and hard work he's done exposing the chicanery of BSP/J.Martin. It's actually an amazing tale of American literary craziness and scandal. It should more widely be known by all literature lovers, notwithstanding their feelings about Buk.
I got turned on to him probably when I was 17, 18 and now I'm in my fifties (godang?!) It may have been Notes of A Dirty Old Man or Dancing In the Tournefortia--and I was hooked. Just ballsy and beautiful, gutsy and full of heart. As a writer myself what influenced me from Hank? His way with the line, the razor sharpness, the conciseness, the way his best poems are like movies in space and lift you off the ground. Or slug you in the gut--and then you say thank you.
I just found Abel Debritto's volumes, Essential Bukowski and Storm For the Living and Dead. Thank you Abel for all you've done for CB's legacy. I'm going through them now and it's been a while since I've really read his work. I just see the beauty, the grace, the pain, the struggle to be heard. And he was, boy was he heard.
When it comes to the Martin bowdlerization scandal I didn't know till later, maybe three years ago. But I recall picking up some of those books and feeling nonplussed--something definitely wasn't right--I chalked it up to greed and BS just putting out whatever scraps Buk left lying around in his ashtray. But it makes sense. One of the ironies I was contemplating tonight was that BS pushed Buk into the world, giving him the forum he might never have had (despite what MJP and others say) and then basically gutted his work later on. Strange. More than anything I'd say it was jealousy (and not just "prudery") that made him do that to his star writer. But who knows what would have happened without BS. He could have gone for years getting published by Graywolf, Copper Canyon, or whatever small press. His pals from New Orleans? The terrible irony is real and it is there.
One last idea(s): I think what led me to stop reading Buk for long periods is I started to see through the costume/mask and I got bored, frankly. My opinion--and I know many will oppose this--is that many of his books have TOO MANY poems in them. They just repeat and repeat--themes, ideas, even the same stories. The racetrack, the bars, the whores... Okay, got it. It's interesting that he was begging to have Martin put out more work but more of what? The same stories? How many more times did we need to hear about his writing development, getting rejected by magazines, living on skid row, his "women," etc. I mean it's interesting, even fascinating--for a while. But then, it flickers out. And there's a lot of this repetition in his work. So I pulled away. Got bored, basically. Also--and I know I'm going on, forgive me--we all know that much of his work turns on this personality thing--or "persona"--but the ego, after a while really overwhelms his work. Me, me, me. The myth of Bukowski, on and on. It's cloying and others have made such a critique--and it's a fair one.
Yet he's also great. His heights for me are Septuagenarian Stew and Betting On The Muse. (Thank god that one wasn't tampered with!!) I adore those books, filled both with verse and short fiction. Why do I like those? They're his most mature and his themes aren't so interlocked with his own mythologizing of "himself." He speaks more from/about his own real inner life. It's often breathtaking. And heartbreaking. That poem about the room where he recounts all the lonely people that slept there, the layers of gum stuck under the bed revealing their very lives and deaths. For me those two books have real treasures in them, the late Buk. Not that the earlier books don't. But I think a different editor could have helped. Not in the ugly and traitorous manner of unsanctioned revision; but someone who could have plucked out the needless repetitions. Doesn't ultimately matter. His best work will last.
Sorry this was so long.