Portions From a Wine-Stained Notebook (2 Viewers)

That's great news! And it's gonna have 300 pages! Too bad they're not gonna publish a hardcover version, but what the hay - it's a new Buk book!
 
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I don't care how they put it out. A lot of publishers turned it down, so we should just be happy that it is coming out at all.
 
They did? That's funny. I would think it's a sure money maker, but obviously some publishers must've thought differently since they turned it down...:confused:
 
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Well, what I heard was it made the rounds quite a bit and City Lights was kind of the last hope. Luckily, they bit.
 
Fortunate indeed. Naturally, I hope the book does well, but not just so they'll do another one. I've always liked Ferlinghetti and the mission of City Lights.

So has HarperCollins been disappointed with sales of Buk since their take-over? You'd think that if things are selling well they'd want to keep this in their Buk line.
 
So has HarperCollins been disappointed with sales of Buk since their take-over?
No idea. Maybe they don't have an option for prose or anything beyond the posthumous poetry books, who knows. I don't know if it was even offered to them. But I know it was shopped around, so maybe they passed on it.

Perhaps someone more familiar with the how the book came to be will shed some light.
 
New Bukowski from City Lights

Hello one and all:

My name's Garrett Caples and I've been handling a new collection of uncollected Bukowski, Portions from a Wine-Stained Notebook, published by City Lights and edited by David Calonne, who did the collection of interviews, Sunlight Here I Am. This will come out in the fall and has lots of goodies: his first and last published short stories, his first and last essays, first Notes of a DOM column, pieces on the Rolling Stones, Artaud, Pound, and so on. 300 pages worth!

Anyway, I'd like to inquire among you as I'm certain there are people here much better acquainted with Buk. What we're looking for at City Lights is appropriate people to blurb the book, living authors with some reputation. I'm really uncertain who this would be.

Any suggestions will be most appreciated! Please post here or send me an email at: [email protected].

Thanks!

Garrett Caples
Editorial Assistant
City Lights Books
 
Hi Garrett,
Of course, Ferlinghetti.....

Also, Tom Waits would be a great one.

Just don't use Bono...

Also, are you even considering doing a nice, case bound hardcover edition of the book for those of us that will buy them up like treasures? Maybe an edition of 100 deluxe hardcovers...

Bill
 
Most of his contemporaries (at least those who are fairly well known) are dead now. How about using older comments, such as Corrington's comment about Bukowski's writing being "... the spoken word nailed to the page." It doesn't matter who wrote it... a good comment is a good comment.

And yes please, a small hardcover edition (for us fanatics) would be fantastic.

And, no offense but, change that cover art. It's ugly. Hell, I'll design the cover for free (well, free plus a copy of the book).
 
And, no offense but, change that cover art. It's ugly. Hell, I'll design the cover for free (well, free plus a copy of the book).

When I hear wine stained I think dark red like the wine Bukowski favored, RED WINE. The green seemed a little off. Chronic will do a good job and he might use the green anyway. Check out his web page, first class.
 
And, no offense but, change that cover art. It's ugly.
Yes, it looks inspirational. Like one of those books about learning about life from your dog named after a Reggae singer, or how to enrich your life by spending one day a week with a senile old fucker who keeps playing with his balls.

Jesus christ, do I have to do everything for you people? THIS is how it's done these days! Get out of that fucking mausoleum City Lights once in a while and see what the kids are up to. Fuck.


portions3.jpg



portions4.jpg



portions2.jpg


You can have any one of those for fifteen grand. Cash, none of that 1099 or IOU bullshit.

Okay, I'm glad I could fix that before it was too late.
 
gerald locklin, it seems to me, has got to be the likely candidate for penning a blurb. he's alive, for one thing, and he does have the rep. oh yeh, and he knew bukowski.

i also vote for mjp's first pic to be used!
 
I know its a long shot, but Bob Dylan has mentioned Bukowski a couple of times on his Theme Time Radio Hour show. Maybe you can blurb him.

I notice they used Leonard Cohen on Pleasures of the Damned, anyone know where that quote comes from?
 
gerald locklin,

yep. I was also thinking about Gerry.
Not only was he a friend of Buk, he was it back to Those days, when the 'Notes' column was going on.

another one would be his German translator and friend Carl Weissner.



and, er, of course the Charles-Bukowski-Society is available.
;-))



ps:
I don't find the layout to be so bad. Just change the color to deep-wine-red and everythings fine.
 
How about Henry Rollins? He might be up for that. What ever you do don't ask that cartoonist Roddy goddamn Doyle please!!!!! He ruined the latest Ham on Rye edition for me and I had to pick up a new copy of the black sparrow press edition to replace the one I'd lost. It's a travesty he was ever asked to do the foreword in the first place and i couldn't take another one. Good luck with things anyhow.
 
How about Henry Rollins? He might be up for that. What ever you do don't ask that cartoonist Roddy goddamn Doyle please!!!!! He ruined the latest Ham on Rye edition for me and I had to pick up a new copy of the black sparrow press edition to replace the one I'd lost. It's a travesty he was ever asked to do the foreword in the first place and i couldn't take another one. Good luck with things anyhow.

Rollins has publicly stated that although he liked reading Bukowski when he was young, he does not find much value in it anymore. I believe that he accused those of reading Bukowski past their early 20's as being immature. I can think of no one that I would rather NOT write a blurb. He is absolutely not a fan of Bukowski's work. He was for a very short time, but not any more. What would his blurb say? "You'll love this book if you are male and between the ages of 14 and 21. If you like it and are older than 21, then you need to grow up. --- Henry Rollins, Musician" There is a thread here somewhere about him. Clearly Rollins only scratched the surface and thinks that all Bukowski is about is drinking, fighting and screwing. It is funny as I found that many of Rollins early poetry books seemed to be poor Bukowski rip off poems. I have not read him in a while.

Bill
 
Here's my quote

"Notebook? What notebook?"

:cool:

(No, I don't like the title :D)
 
Hey, Garrett. Waits is an excellent suggestion. You guys also have access to Sam Shepard, so you might try him as well. I would also contact Denis Cooper ("God Jr."), who seems to have more than a little Bukowski influence in his work and he resonates with the Rollins-despised 14-21 demographic, as does Chuck Palahniuk, so giving him a shout out wouldn't hurt either.

Another off the top of my head is Matt Ruff. If you don't have contact info for Matt, you can reach him through his website: http://home.att.net/~storytellers/

Jack Schwartzman, poet laureate of San Francisco, hell, he's in the store every day. Grab him for a quote next time you see him.

I would also try a few noted L.A. authors/social observers like Bruce Wagner or Michael Tolkin. If Tolkin or Wagner don't feel up to cooperating, let me know and I'll think of someone else but you definitely need some L.A. folk for blurbs.

Say hi to Scott, Don, Gent, and Paul for me.

Cheers,

Rodger Jacobs
 
Also, grab something from Sean Penn. He and Buk had a teasured friendship. Penn's office is down the street at Zoetrope or ask the owner of Tosca to hook you up (can't recall her name just now).
 
Yes, believe it or not, blurbs can lead to compulsive buys, especially if the authors/artists who provide the pull quote are closely linked in form, style, etc., to the author in quesion.
 
Hello all:

Thanks for these suggestions! We're taking them under consideration.

Jack Hirschman's a good idea except that he's in the book [the Artaud Anthology review], so we're trying to get some outsiders. [And Lawrence can't blurb a book he's publishing!]

But these other suggestions are very helpful--I like the idea of getting someone non-literary to blurb it.

The book should be hitting the shelves in October--I'll try to keep everyone informed.

Best,
g
 
[And Lawrence can't blurb a book he's publishing!]

Hi Garrett: OF COURSE Lawrence could blurb it! That would be very welcome in my mind. Tyrranus Buk and all that.

That said, the hardcover idea is something that I have been pushing. You have no idea how much we would dig a hardcover on this one...

Cheers,

Stick
 
City Lights does not publish hard cover editions. Period. Lawrence founded the company as an "all-paperback" bookstore and publishing house (i.e., affordable) and it has been that way since day one -- though they do sell hard cover books from other publishing concerns in the store now, they don't publish them. Just not cost effective.
 
Yes, that was 1979, however, and a limited run. City Lights was founded as the first paperback bookstore and publisher in America and stays true to that concept to this day. When you consider some of the esoterica they publish -- i.e., a limited audience for their authors -- sticking to a paperback format only makes sense. There's not much profit in a limited, 100-edition run of a title, 10 percent maybe a little more. Not worth it.
 
Assume that it cost $20 to have a book casebound. They sell it for $39.95. They make a 49% profit.....

I also think that you can have a book casebound for less than $20. If they sent me the 100 paper copies to have made into hardcovers, I could do it for less than that.

If it is not profitable, I would not expect them to do it, but it would clearly sell as they seem to have sold all 300 copies of that book from 1979 and that was not a book of short stories, which would attract more readers than a book of mostly photos.

Bill
 
To an extent, Bill, I agree with you and concede to your knowledge of publishing. However, City Lights is still functioning under the Old Guard (Lawrence and Nancy) and things will remain the same. Chapbooks excluded, they only publish 12 new titles annually.

Garrett, it doesn't matter if Jack is in the book; you can still get him to provide a simple and general pull-quote on Bukowski and/or his work. And the same principle applies to Lawrence: a general observation about an author that he has published to much success, not specifically about Portions.
 
Yes, believe it or not, blurbs can lead to compulsive buys, especially if the authors/artists who provide the pull quote are closely linked in form, style, etc., to the author in quesion.
I guess that's true, considering that people continue to discover Bukowski for the first time every day. Something I would never have guessed were it not for this forum.
 
Just yesterday, MJP, my friend Don Campana, who has worked at City Lights for years, told me that every day they get customers in the store looking for advice on what Bukowski they should read as newcomers to his work.
 
I know its a long shot, but Bob Dylan has mentioned Bukowski a couple of times on his Theme Time Radio Hour show. Maybe you can blurb him.

And again: Dylan read a Bukpoem on his latest Theme Time Radio Hour.
The poem, paraphrased, was about a cold wind - hoping the boys on the street have a bottle of red - and how you notice everything has locks when your living on the street.
I'm hoping someone can tell me off hand which poem it is. Will have to dig it up myself otherwise...
How about it Hank So?:o
 

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