Hemingway, Bukowski, boxing (1 Viewer)

[adrian]

By the way, you can read that boxing story, "Class," in NORTH OF NO SOUTH. I think I first read it in A BUKOWSKI SAMPLER -- of which I do not currently have copy, so I can't check that it's in there. Anyone have a copy of SAMPLER handy? (the sound of men running to their bookcases all around America and Europe).

Part two of this epic will have to wait until tomorrow night. My wife is sleepy after digging in her garden all day and me clacking on the keys is keeping her awake...

Bit of a boxing fan here so here goes............

Re the boxing - if my memory serves me correctly, I read in a Jack Dempsey biography that Hemingway claimed he could hold his own in a sparring session with a certain fighter (I could be wrong, but I think it was Dempsey himself)

A sparring session was arranged and Hemingway rather quickly and painfully discovered the difference between a top pro fighter and a writer who fancied himself as a fighter (he was quickly KO'd)

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Both "Class" and "The Time I Knocked Out Ernest Hemingway..." have similar themes.

I just picked up a copy of Laugh Literary And Man The Humping Guns Vol. 1 No. 3.

"Class" and "The Time I Knocked Out Ernest Hemingway and Was Discovered as a New Literary Giant" are/is the same story.

"The Time I Knocked Out Ernest Hemingway and Was Discovered as a New Literary Giant" is a bit more raw, with Bukowski being his own editor.

The "Class" version in South of No North has the old editor's touch to it. It's more "refined" and editorial "mistakes" are corrected.

In the process, I noticed a mistake Martin made while cleaning it up. The copy I have of South Of No North is from 1992, so maybe the mistake is there to this day.

Laugh Literary And Man The Humping Guns Vol. 1 No. 3.

South Of No North

 

[mjp]

"Class" and "The Time I Knocked Out Ernest Hemingway and Was Discovered as a New Literary Giant" are/is the same story.

Fixed. Thanks.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

One other thing I should have noted because I've seen this topic come up on the forum and I find it interesting (The whole Bukowski/Chinaski alter ego thing. Well, not alter ego, but maybe drunk Bukowski versus not-as-drunk Bukowski).

In the Laugh Literary version, Bukowski refers to himself as Charles Bukowski. (Again, this is a much rawer version that Buk had full control over.)

In the South Of No North version, Bukowski refers to himself as Henry Chinaski. (A much more "edited" version).

By 1973, maybe Bukowski considered himself famous enough to use Chinaski?

Or maybe Martin was building what he hoped would be a long-running serial character?

Thoughts?

(I'm happy to post the Laugh Literary version if people want to compare the two. I just don't want to eat up too much server space or unnecessarily have MJP resize images, etc.)

 

[mjp]

I'm happy to post the Laugh Literary version if people want to compare the two.

Don't worry about space re: uploads. But personally, I don't care to see any prose comparisons. Others may disagree.

I know it could be considered a fine line, but editing prose - even to make it shittier, as John Martin inevitably did - isn't as big a deal (to me) as editing poetry. You can remove or replace a dozen words in a paragraph of a story and still maintain the purpose and even the flow.

The same can't be said for poetry. Changing a single word can change the entire poem. As we've seen countless times in the posthumous collections.

 

[Purple Stickpin]

Our bones
Like stems into the sky
Will forever cry

[Victory]

 

[Skygazer]

One other thing I should have noted because I've seen this topic come up on the forum and I find it interesting (The whole Bukowski/Chinaski alter ego thing. Well, not alter ego, but maybe drunk Bukowski versus not-as-drunk Bukowski).

In the South Of No North version, Bukowski refers to himself as Henry Chinaski. (A much more "edited" version).
By 1973, maybe Bukowski considered himself famous enough to use Chinaski?
Or maybe Martin was building what he hoped would be a long-running serial character?
Thoughts?

I think I would prefer to credit Bukowski with his long running anti hero, rather than John Martin.
Chinaski first appears in Confessions of a Man Insane Enough... from 1965 doesn't he? then in Post Office 1971 so, Bukowski gets my vote.

 

[Ponder]

I believe a pre Chinaski- which is the same to me, appeared way earlier. I forgot the name, it's posted somewhere on the forum.
Chelaski or something. Oh, here it is: https://bukowskiforum.com/threads/hello-matrix-1946.57/

 

[GDPR 4124]

Our bones
Like stems into the sky
Will forever cry

[Victory]

If you use this poem ("Song for this Softly Weeping Sorrow", right?) as an example of the huge significance of a single word, I think I get it. If not, has this poem too been edited sometime?

Speaking of boxing, does anyone know the source of this picture?

 

[Skygazer]

Bit of a boxing fan here so here goes............
sparring session was arranged and Hemingway rather quickly and painfully discovered the difference between a top pro fighter and a writer who fancied himself as a fighter (he was quickly KO'd)

Your right:) I think he may have looked the part, but that's where it ends. There are separate accounts from both Hemingway in A Moveable Feast and Wyndham Lewis in his biography, of when they first met in Paris at Ezra Pound's place, where he (Hemingway) and Pound were sparring.

"Ezra had not been boxing very long and I was embarrassed at having him work in front of anyone he knew, and I tried to make him look as good as possible," the onlooker was Wyndham Lewis, who had known Pound in London.
His account:
A splendidly built young man, stripped to the waist, and with a torso of dazzling white, was standing not far from me. He was tall, handsome and serene, and was repelling with his boxing gloves a hectic assault of Ezra's. After a final swing at the dazzling solar plexus Pound fell back upon his settee. The young man was Hemingway. Pound got on like a house on fire with this particular statue.

 

[mjp]

has this poem too been edited sometime?

If you consider cutting out most of the poem as "editing," then yes.

Martin's excerpting of some of Bukowski's poems for book section intros or to give to publishers as "complete" works is just another example of how little he valued the work. Or of what an editing genius he considered himself to be. Either way it was unnecessary and pointless.

 

[roni]

"Class" and "The Time I Knocked Out Ernest Hemingway and Was Discovered as a New Literary Giant" [...]

in some older thread I pointed out that the 'idea' behind the story is to be found in a much earlier letter of Bukowski, (where he also explains the 'meaning' of him beating Hem: the boxing stands for their writing, so Bukowski's victory means, that he's a better writer (now) than Hem. So much for the claim Bukowski never used metaphors.)

[...] does anyone know the source of this picture?

I seem to remember it's been taken during the filming of 'Barfly' by MM.