Hello! (1 Viewer)

Skygazer

And in the end...
Just looking at the timeline for references to the poem Hello which apparently appeared in Matrix 1946 along with two other poems later on, but same year (Matrix reference is there).Also can't see any reference to the short story award he won in 1944 on the timeline, is it because there is no evidence?
Would love to see these earlier poems. Similarly, a couple from 1956 in The Naked Ear and Quixote? They may be here in the forum from way back - will look.
Then the eight which were published in Harlequin in 1957 with Frye. Timeline just says co-edited magazine,which poems were they? or where can I find them now? Help:)
 
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You're welcome, Roni. :)

I've wasted spent eight months (of the only life I have) reading some eight years' worth of posts here.
wacko.gif

Too much time on my hands, yeah.
 
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Thank you so much zobraks... that's amazing really!:).
For some reason I'm really interested in the period between him enrolling in the creative writing course (?for one class!) getting some stuff published, winning an award and then giving up (almost) was it just a young man's frustration and impatience with the lack of recognition from the big publishers? Then the sudden outpouring of poems post gastric haemorrhage.(Nothing like a near death experience to galvanise you).
Delighted to see the early work, now zobraks about that early story that won the award??...:wb:
 
You're welcome, Skygazer. :)
Cirerita and David did the job, though.

now zobraks about that early story that won the award??...:wb:
I'm not even sure I knew anything about it until you mentioned it, but if it's here around the forum someone will find it for sure.
 
Perhaps it was Aftermath of a Lengthy Rejection Slip as it was 1944 when he was 24?
The reference to the award is for Story magazine and comes from Davis S Calonne: Sunlight Here I Am, pg 81.Things are looking good, he is supposed to meet a New York agent.
But instead he decides to do a runner, felt he wasn't ready (maybe fear of failing, who knows) made for a much more interesting but punishing, chaotic life and possibly better writing.
 
The reference to the award is for Story magazine and comes from Davis S Calonne: Sunlight Here I Am, pg 81.
Just checked it:
William Childress said:
The short story won a prestigious Story award in 1944
I suppose W. Childress just wrote what Bukowski had told him. Perhaps it was a misunderstanding since Buk probably considered the publishing of Aftermath of a Lengthy Rejection Slip in Story a reward in itself.
Or Buk just spiced his biography up.

Whatever the case, you can read the Aftermath of a Lengthy Rejection Slip in Portions from a Wine-stained Notebook. Page 1.

Oh, and here's the Poem for Personnel Managers, published in Quixote, Spring 1957 (thanks to Jason).
As the Sparrow is also there.

The poem "Lay Over" from The Naked Ear can be found (as Layover) in The Roominghouse Madrigals, page 51. Great poem.
 
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You can see the trend of the early publication history in the chronological list of magazine appearances. The lists are part of the database that no one ever looks at.


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The list demonstrates pretty clearly that there was not a ten year drunk, or a ten year period of no writing/publication. There were a few years of inactivity, but they came so early in his career that I would hardly call them an interruption in (what became) his steady and relentless assault on the literary magazines of the time. The few years off came before he really got started.

As for knowing more about his life during certain periods, there are big chunks (the early 1950s in Los Angeles, in particular - the same time he "gave up writing" and lived in rooming houses) that are just black holes, and we'll probably never know what he was really doing then. Outside of the hints in his writing.

But if you look at what we do know for sure, it's home, a stab at city college, a few years roaming around (and avoiding the draft, and coming back to Los Angeles from time to time), then back to Los Angeles to stay, where he worked for a few years and (apparently) didn't write much. Until the hospital episode, after which he seems to have changed into a writing machine.

Had the bleeding ulcer not took him down in 1954 he may have just lived and died as just another anonymous Los Angeles factory worker. Or not. No way to really know, but if you look at what he was doing at the time (a lot of nothing), it's possible. Coming close to death definitely seemed to change his outlook on everything though.

Then again, most people change a bit in their 30s. You realize you're probably going to be alive for a while and maybe you have to get your shit together after all. So who knows.
 
Wow, hadn't ever looked in the advanced search bit, that all deserves a more prominent place I think:), for the more databases challenged types like me.

I'm still confused about his decision not go and see this literary agent after ?winning the writing award in Story. Half of what I read about him in his 20s has him railing against the established publishers and their lack of foresight and staid choices.

He then starts to see a little success upon which, he takes off! it wasn't as if he had to keep on the move anymore to evade the draft issue, as that had been resolved. So on the one hand he seems impatient and deflated about his lack of early success, but then scared and "not ready" when a little comes his way. Unless I am taking everything as gospel.

PS The early poems zobraks posted above, is it possible for them to be added to the poems collected and uncollected page? - the first one starts at 1959, but that might be for some specific reason?
 
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I'm still confused about his decision not go and see this literary agent after ?winning the writing award in Story.
It probably never happened, since there was no award. Story published Aftermath, they did not give him an award. Regardless of what he may have said during one interview.
The early poems zobraks posted above, is it possible for them to be added to the poems collected and uncollected page?
I think you're referring to the manuscript pages. Copies of magazine appearances wouldn't belong there.
 
I think it was @Olaf who really got the thing started. As far as lighting the initial fire.

back in the days, "we" did Olaf a lot of unjust nogood. (at least that's what I think and have thought back then and said so back then)
But being pointed to this thread from 2006, there comes some tragic into it, since it DOES seem that He was the first one to point out the changes and give the idea of "heavy editing".

btw:
I appreciate mjp's guts, to point to this thread. Later forum-members can't know or imagine, what it means, to give Olaf such credit. Just believe me: that was a most decent move by mjp.
 
But being pointed to this thread from 2006, there comes some tragic into it, since it DOES seem that He was the first one to point out the changes and give the idea of "heavy editing".
I don't know any of this history, but let me just say that I do appreciate the work that has been done to illuminate the issue. And I agree with Roni's praise to MJP for telling it straight - which, from what I can tell, he has consistently done all along.
 

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