Short Story Collections (1 Viewer)

[el23]

Hey all,

I'm pretty excited to have found this site. I hope that this forum continues to grow - I've been reading through past posts and the discussion here is fantastic.

Anyhow, I've read quite a lot of Buk stuff but I wanted some clarification on something I have been wondering about. Could anyone please let me know if there are any short story collections that I am missing:

Notes of a Dirty Old Man
The Most Beautiful Woman in Town
Tales of Ordinary Madness
South of No North
Hot Water Music
Betting on the Muse
Septuagenarian Stew

I'm aware of a few smaller things, such as "There's No Business" with Robert Crumb but I was wondering if there is anything else in the way of short stories that isn't listed here.

Finally, as an aside, would anyone recommend "Shakespeare Never Did This"? I'm thinking of it for my next purchase.

 

[Jason]

Factotum

 

[mjp]

Finally, as an aside, would anyone recommend "Shakespeare Never Did This"? I'm thinking of it for my next purchase.

I like Shakespeare a lot. It's an unusual Bukowski book. It's got everything, pictures, funny stories disguised as a travelogue, and if you buy the Black Sparrow edition, poems.

 

[poptop]

Finally, as an aside, would anyone recommend "Shakespeare Never Did This"? I'm thinking of it for my next purchase.

O lord, yes, that you went ahead and made this purchase. One of my favs! He's as funny and outrageous as hell, and you get to meet some of his relatives in Europe. Plus there are the great Michael Montfort pictures (B's buddy), hilarious antics in France, the fun of drinking on the run, and Bukowski pulling the leg of the irrepressible, exhuberant German maid. Not to be missed by Buksters everywhere.

 

[HenryChinaski]

yeah I love shakespeare never did this as well.
I also love the captain is out to lunch and the sailors have taken over the ship
get that if you don't have it. its like a journal.
p.s. jason, factotum isnt a short story collection silly.

 

[Mikey]

All are mind expanding for those of us that understand what his lifestyle was about. Look at "Septagenarian Stew" for more short stories. I am currently reading his bio by Barry Miles, a good read for someone who recently lost his "Jane".

 

[Buk's neighbor]

love all the Bukowski short story collections...

Think the short story books are a great place to start...and finish!

These compilations DO seem to go well w/ Sept-Stew. :)

Honest, think the short story books probably long term faves...

 

[Bruno Dante]

I've only just read 'Hot Water Music' for the very first time. I think I'll have to check out 'Sept. Stew' next.

 

[roni]

[...] I think I'll have to check out 'Sept. Stew' next.

tell us what you think about it, when you're done.
I remember it was the story-collection that got me the least. (even though I do like the concept itself: having poems AND stories in one book.)

Factotum

that's a good point Jason. good point.

 

[David]

Drew Barrymore weighs in on "Ham on Rye"

Ms. Drew lists "Ham on Rye" as one of her favorite books.

 

[roni]

...Drew ...

That's pretty cool!


(I also like her comments to these books. They show good spirit.)

 

[mjp]

Considering the first 18 or 20 years of her life, it's not really surprising that she relates to Bukowski's stories. When you're 9 years old and doing blow off Truman Capote's make up mirror in the bathroom at Studio 54, you've got some parenting issues. She was a train wreck for a long time.

 

[Rekrab]

roni -- I never liked the mixing of short stories and poems in one collection -- by any author. I like them pure. All stories or all poems. Not sure why. Maybe I just don't like the sudden change of pace.

 

[Purple Stickpin]

Amen, brother. It's like the way my Irish Mother used to eat. Meat, potatoes and veg all very distinct on the plate and not touching one another. Eat one at a time, finish it, then move on.

Of course, Irish beef stew is a common thing, so there goes my theory.

 

[bospress.net]

I could go for some nice Lamb Stew. There is a nice Irish place about 45 minutes north of here that plays authentic Irish drinking music and has great Irish food and beer....

I gotta head up there.

Bill

p.s. Back on topic. I like my poems and stories in separate volumes too.

 

[Gerard K H Love]

Mix it up. It's all going into the same place. Let my food touch the other courses and I'll have a short story right after a poem and then another poem. Dessert has to be separated and spaced out.
A poem that is reflecting on the same subject or experience as a short story goes well with it in the same part of a book.

I knew a guy who had severe obsessive compulsive disorder and his food had to be on separate plates and eaten with freshly cleaned utensils. What a hell he lives in. That is why they invented Thorazine and other sedatives. I just have simple claustrophobia, no big deal. That guy use to wash the hell out his hands all of the time.

 

[Bukfan]

I like my poems and stories in separate volumes too.

Same here! Why mix coffee and tea together.

Mix it up. It's all going into the same place.

You deviant you!

I knew a guy who had severe obsessive compulsive disorder and his food had to be on separate plates and eaten with freshly cleaned utensils.

I knew a guy always ate 3-4 different sandwiches for dinner and started having a bite of one sandwich, then a bite of the next and so on until he was finished eating. :D

 

[Rekrab]

OCD. That explains why I don't like poems mixed with short stories. It's unclean! I hope that never happens to me as an author. The only time it doesn't bother me is when it's one of those huge volumes that are the complete works of an author, and if it's a Nineteenth Century author, someone like Poe, it's almost acceptable. But a modern author -- the poems should be on different plates from the short stories, eaten with different forks, at different times of day.

 

[Gerard K H Love]

-- the poems should be on different plates from the short stories, eaten with different forks, at different times of day.

Oh, that's just forked up, man.

 

[poptop]

I've had no problem with it because I never read any of Bukowski's short story/poem collections straight through anyway. I would pick out whatever I was in the mood for at the time - all of it seemed fresh and new - and the totality of it somehow held together. I also felt that he considered both forms of writing on an entirely equal plane and could move easily from one world to the other; so naturally it seemed organic to him to combine the two. It's a rare writer who has this gift, and it's one more quality that is a reflection of his genius.

 

[zenguru]

OCD. That explains why I don't like poems mixed with short stories. It's unclean! I hope that never happens to me as an author. The only time it doesn't bother me is when it's one of those huge volumes that are the complete works of an author, and if it's a Nineteenth Century author, someone like Poe, it's almost acceptable. But a modern author -- the poems should be on different plates from the short stories, eaten with different forks, at different times of day.

If it were any other author, I'd likely agree with you. But it's Bukowski. Just how bad can it be?

 

[Rekrab]

It's not that it's bad, any of it, taken alone. It's all good. But mixed together, poems and stories, it seems less than it could have been to me. A box full of spare parts.

 

[zenguru]

It's not that it's bad, any of it, taken alone. It's all good. But mixed together, poems and stories, it seems less than it could have been to me. A box full of spare parts.

That's probably how God put Bukowski together.

 

[panamar]

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