His work is so great - incomparable

Hmm...I seem to recall that Bukowski was not very kind to Ebert in Hollywood, his novelization of the making of Barfly.

Ebert: Hmm...I seem to recall that he was.

My favorite piece of Bukowski; it reminds me the most of how I imagined him to be.

Coincidently enough Roger, I have indeed been thinking about Bukowski... Hmm... I wonder if it's something in the weather.

Anyway, I wrote a blog about "Barfly" earlier this week (in response to the diss of it in "Precious"): http://moviesaremyreligion.blogspot.com/2009/12/whats-so-precious-about-barfly.html

It's not (unless I'm hit by a car tomorrow, which could happen), the last time I'll write about him but I probably spent too much time ranting about/ defending his lifestyle and not enough time talking about how fun the movie is, how inspiring his work is for me, not as an alcoholic writer, but more in terms of what his work celebrated:

"This is very important -- to take leisure time. Pace is the essence. Without stopping entirely and doing nothing at all for great periods, you're gonna lose everything...just to do nothing at all, very, very important. And how many people do this in modern society? Very few. That's why they're all totally mad, frustrated, angry and hateful."

Have you ever considered that in "Barfly" he wrote the film that we all had the thrilling feeling "Fight Club" was going to be after its first act?

Ebert: Not really...

He was not only a good writer but a guy who got way with everything we might have wanted to try but didn't dare, or tried and failed at.

I own the original neon sign for the classic Skid Row bar, Craby Joe's, which can be seen in the beginning and ending scenes in the movie Barfly.

The sign is in the process of total restoration. It will once again look exactly as it did in the movie Barfly. After restoration, it's going to get its second run in the Museum of Neon Art in downtown LA. I have many fond memories of Craby Joe's and I'm a faithful admirer of all things Bukowski related.

Thanks for remembering Buk. I'm sure those were exciting times for everyone...

Somehow, while still living with my folks, back in the early 70's, I ran into NOTES OF A DIRTY OLD MAN, published by City Lights Books. What a jolt. Power in the story, high voltage in the crazed take on odd things, thermonuclear clarity in the Depths. "Hey, what the HELL!" Goodness gracious.

What a delight to hear Tom O'Bedlam read the line "it's not often at the age of 55 that such splendid things occur." What a resonant grin that gave me!!

Ebert: I understand Bukowski kept right on grinning to the end.

Dear Roger, my hero, Here is my blogpost abt bukowski.

http://vamseekamana.blogspot.com/search/label/bukowski

Ebert: Nice. He just keeps on winning and holding readers.

Oh, how lovely. I just opened up Tales of Ordinary Madness last night. I am enjoying these videos very much. Thank you.

Let's hear it for City Lights as well, who published so many great writers that noone else would touch. Bukowski, Allan Ginsberg, Georges Bataille..

You just introduced me to a new poet, and a very good one too, judging from http://www.poemhunter.com/charles-bukowski/

Thanks. Now to go read.

Roger:

His obvious affection for you in the fictional account of the barfly movie set was one of many favorite passages.

I can't even remember the book. I think he called you Rick Talbot. I think you drank coffee only. His treatment of your alcoholism was exceedingly tender. I remember thinking, this is probably how it went. I remember thinking, Roger would be this quiet, deferential to a writer of Chuck's power. I remember thinking, wow, Chuck really loves Roger (or Rick), and how strange: he usually reserves his very special hate for other writers.

Talent's kinship with talent, I suppose.

I'm reading another writer you turned me to: McCarthy. I'll be damned if this passage doesn't remind me of Chuck:

"He woke before dawn and watched the gray day break. Slow and half opaque. He rose while the boy slept and pulled on his shoes and wrapped in his blanket he walked out through the trees. He descended into a gryke in the stone and there he crouched coughing and he coughed for a long time. Then he just knelt in the ashes. He raised his face to the paling day. Are you there? he whispered. Will I see you at the last? Have you a neck by which to throttle you? Have you a heart? Damn you eternally have you a soul? Oh God, he whispered. Oh God."

All that's missing is a bottle of red.

Ebert: Two writers with a deep understanding of drinking.

So frank and dirty, Bukowski was an incredible poet. He provided a sort of decadence without dandyism to the late 20th skid row reality. Great choice with SpokenVerse, have you ever seen the youtube channel poetryanimations as well? It is definitely worth a look.

A friend just sent me a link of these old photos of Los Angeles.
http://neat-stuff-blog.blogspot.com/2009/11/vintage-los-angeles.html

And I replied:
The only reason I'd like to have a time machine. Right there. Only I'd probably end up being gross and spending all my time trying to screw Bukowski.

So he is in the air.
I named my son Henry after old Hank.

Thank you for sharing, Roger. It truly made my day. His unique outcast perspective and biting humor helped an oddball like me get through life in my early twenties. I'd be lying if I said I didn't try to emulate him at some point – as both a writer and a drinker – and failed miserably at both.

I'd never seen the video of him riding in the convertible before. I love it. I'll have to revisit "the classics" soon.

Thanks for this page. Makes me very happy. I like the video of Mr. Bukowski in the car in Hollywood - his happiness so incongruous with the squalor and pain he wrote about. Although there was beauty and joy in the writing, too.

When I was seventeen (1984, I think) I bought a copy of "Notes Of A Dirty Old Man" in a used bookstore in Missoula, Montana. It had that crappy black and white cover and inside someone had glued all kinds of photos of fat naked women. How could I not buy it? That was my introduction to Bukowski. I had no idea who he was, but that trashy book lured me in and I've been a fan ever since. I read Fante, too. Lived the dream a bit, even. Although I had to stop living like that. I couldn't handle it :-)

Earlier this year, as a senior in high school I discovered a book of poems by Bukowski- Last Night of the Earth Poems, if I remember correctly. I was immediately drawn in by his stark, and honest way of writing. He had a real gift for finding the humor in a humorless situation, and allowing a reader to do the same with their own lives. My favorite Bukowski poem is Lonely Hearts. It's hard to find it online- I had to search for hours, after I first read it in the book- but it really speaks volumes about the pains of being a friend. Thanks for the post! I really enjoyed it.

Thanks for turning eyes back to Chuck. I would read his poems to my girlfriend and tell her, I am Hank Chinaski. I am Arturo Bandini. We broke up.

Man. How did he do it? I drank for forty-two years and I never had fun once. It was only darkness. Couldn't breathe or talk without it. But Chucky made even his alcoholism sing.

I read Ham on Rye. I read his poems. I read them while drinking several bottles of red. And then I woke up. Told my (fourth) wife, I'm done drinking. And I stopped.

That was 39 days ago. Saints preserve my wretched soul. I am a sick man.

Ebert: But getting well.

I no longer have my copy of "Hollywood" because I've given it away (twice) to filmmaking friends, but I remember him writing that you were a kind, kind man with smiling eyes. Since he rarely described anyone in that manner, I figured it must be true. I've taken his word for it over the years. I love that book. I'm going to get it again (and probably give it away to someone who loves movies again).

For all of his thousands of poems, Bukowski stumbled upon a few really good ones, but the overwhelming majority of his work is doggerel. Worse is his impact on the contemporary "small press" world of poetry, comprised of truck drivers and waiters writing drunken stream of consciousness prose and calling it poetry because they broke the lines in an arbitrary fashion. Bukowski was one of a kind, but wrote in a way that is easily replicated. And those who have tried to mimic him have done so poorly.

I've deeply enjoyed and related to some Bukowski's novels and poetry, and part of me has always romanticized the drunken life he lived because of his incredible writing, but it's awfully hard to forgive the guy for that famous interview clip where he starts kicking the crap out of his wife.

Maybe we should thank the filmmakers and Linda B. for having the guts to give it to us straight and honest. Not defending his actions here, just saying that who else in the world would've let the clip into the film? Kudos to Linda and the filmmakers. & here's to hoping we see a Criterion BARFLY in all it's glory.

His columns for the L.A. Free Press underground newspaper were the soul of the publication

Happy Birthday, Chinaski! Love what you've left behind but wish you'd had a chance to write another novel like Pulp.

Hi Roger,

I'm producing a box set of the last two live readings that Bukowski ever gave, even though he lived and wrote for another 14 years. They're from 1979 and 1980.

I filmed the last reading in Redondo Beach, California - a very memorable event that sat on my shelf for over 25 years before I sought the permission of Linda Lee to release it.

It's now the 30th anniversary of that reading.

I would love to send you a screener for your consideration. We also have major extras including interviews with John Dullaghan, the producer and director of Born into This, Sue Hodson, the Literary Curator at the Huntington Library, which is having a major exhibition on Bukowski next month, and three performances of of Hank's poems from the play, Love, Bukowski.

If you give me an email address, I can send more information, fact sheet, cover art, etc.

Best,

Jon

..and his poems about his cat made me cry.

Very cool. IMHO Buckowski was the purest of all the writers from his generation. There was a lot going on with the Beat movement that was incredible in regard to originality, but Buckowski's comes across so effortlessly and never seemed forced. It is because of these attributes that his work is still relevant. Let's face it, he was "keeping it real" way before it was hip.