[ 3 / biz / cgl / ck / diy / fa / ic / jp / lit / sci / vr / vt ] [ index / top / reports ] [ become a patron ] [ status ]
2023-11: Warosu is now out of extended maintenance.

/lit/ - Literature

View post   
File: 41 KB, 448x293, charles-bukowski.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
2335473 No.2335473 [Reply] [Original]

Bukowski. What does /lit/ think of him ?

I assume pretentious insults is all you have for him , prove me wrong.

>> No.2335475

He's the Skrillex of poetry.

>> No.2335474

women and post office are real good, his poetry is not

thanks for stopping by

>> No.2335478

>>2335473
>I assume pretentious insults is all you have for him , prove me wrong.
nope you're completely right
guy's a hack
only potsmokers/alcoholics/atheists/jobless people like him

>> No.2335479

>>2335473
He repeats himself a lot.
He's a better poemer than a novelist, but much of his poetry is just alright. Every now and then he writes a stunning one, though.

>> No.2335480

>>2335478
What did you read of his that you didn't like and why?

>> No.2335483

>>2335479
I actually fancy his novels over his poetry, although I do like his poetry a great deal. His poetry is either really good or pretty bad, in my opinion.

I've read Factotum, Post Office, and Women. I thought they were all amazing.

>> No.2335485

I like him. "Bluebird" is definitely one of my favorite poems.

By the way, there's a decent documentary about him entitled Born into This. I recommend it.

>> No.2335484

I liked him when I was 16 and 17. Once you grow up a bit you realise what an egomaniacal, talentless arsehole he was. I reckon that in a few decades he'll be completely obscure.

>> No.2335486

>>2335478
I'm an unemployed pot smoking atheist and I think he's fucking shit.

>> No.2335490

>>2335484
I admit I liked him a lot more when I was younger, his books were one of the first I read repeatedly and the first writer I actually went out and tried to find more of his work.

Although when I bought Factotum and Women ,after I first read Post Office, the cashier talked to me about him and told me I would eventually grow out of him.

>> No.2335492

>>2335485
I'll definitely look into that. Tabby Cat and A Future Congressmen are the ones that stick out beyond the others in my mind.

>> No.2335495

Never read any of his novels. His poetry is god awful. Easily the worst 'professional' poet of all time. He's also one of the most successful which boggles the mind. Plebs gonna pleb I guess.

>> No.2335532

Pulp is one of my favourite novels.

>> No.2335575

>>2335484
are you me?

I have a hatred for the beats in general. Only because they have inspired a whole horde of undisiplined, angsty, pseudo writers. In other words they talk about natural tallent.

In other words they are to blame for the never ending threads of hurr I wrote this in 5 mins. It is my poem. I am a writer, right?

>> No.2335598

Bukowski is a miserable fuck. I appreciate his poetry because unlike the beats, he wasn't insipid enough to believe in poetry as spirituality or as the saving grace of a lost generation. He wrote what he knew and he was a dirty old man. He had the kind of honesty that you won't find in beat poets. That said, his poetry isn't the greatest. What you see on the page is what you get. You either like the ramblings of a perverted old bastard or you hate them. Depends on your aesthetics.

And fucking "pulp". Greatest detective story ever.

Take from it what you will, but the guy's no Kerouac and that's why I like him. Fuck Kerouac.

>> No.2335623

To The Whore Who Took My Poems by Charles Bukowski


some say we should keep personal remorse from the
poem,
stay abstract, and there is some reason in this,
but jezus;
twelve poems gone and I don't keep carbons and you have
my
paintings too, my best ones; its stifling:
are you trying to crush me out like the rest of them?
why didn't you take my money? they usually do
from the sleeping drunken pants sick in the corner.
next time take my left arm or a fifty
but not my poems:
I'm not Shakespeare
but sometime simply
there won't be any more, abstract or otherwise;
there'll always be mony and whores and drunkards
down to the last bomb,
but as God said,
crossing his legs,
I see where I have made plenty of poets
but not so very much
poetry.

>> No.2335641

>>2335623
Love that shit.

>> No.2335649

Every middle-class American male has a post-adolescent Bukowski phase.

You grow out of it.

>> No.2335666
File: 122 KB, 449x258, bukowski.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
2335666

People get into Bukowski thinking that he's some kind of refined intellectual, which is clearly not the case, and are let down, or feel that they've been cheated. He is a good author and poet, but you'll only find him good if you can understand that his work is his own. He writes what he knows, and what he's lived. He's self-loathing, and an egomanic.

If you pick up "Love is a Dog From Hell" expecting W.B. Yeats or something, you're going to be disappointed. Accept him for what he was: a dirty old man who didn't want to interact with people and hated everyone and everything around him, and you'll like him.

And the most important thing about him is that you either like his works or you don't. There's no middleground. It comes down to whether or not you can agree with him, or you can't.

>> No.2335687

>>2335666 He's self-loathing, and an egomanic.

Hmmm.

>> No.2335696

>>2335687
That's the only way I could put it. He has a severely out of whack personality.