I avoided Bukowski in high school without even trying, simply because I had no male authority guiding me to his work. Nor did I ever reach for Bukowski in college. None of my syllabi included him, as I focused my coursework on Indian and South Asian writers, and later ultra-contemporary short stories. But the real reason I never touched his work at that age? No man I wanted to sleep with thought I should. Until I left school, and really until I met my current partner a year and a half after that, I aligned my taste in literature, in music, in whatever I could with the sensitive young men who caught my always looking eye.
I spent my first year in New York City going on a lot of dates. But Trevor left an especially bad taste in my mouth. Thanks to him, I associated Bukowski with condescension, infidelity, and a sheer unwillingness to sexually satisfy a woman.
I read for only myself now, focusing exclusively on young female writers with a powerful story to tell. My current partner has Bukowski cover art tattooed on his left bicep. He has a tattered copy of Women he read after a terrible breakup six years ago. The moment I learned that, I knew I would have to read it too. They can be clever, sensitive, and creative.
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Incorrect Book The list contains an incorrect book please specify the title of the book. Welcome back. View all 4 comments. Write a comment It makes for a very good intro to Bukowski's prose since it bares the hallmarks and stylistic traits good and bad that appear in all his other novels and it's short enough to read in an evening, so if you end up finding Bukowski unpalatable you'll only have wasted a couple hours. So yeah, start here and then read Hollywood, his second to last and best novel.
View 1 comment. Tunde Oyebode I would recommended Ham on Rye which provides a somewhat autobiographical account of bukowksi's or chinaski's early life. I understand that this is the last of his books with his alter-ago Hank Chinaski.
I want to read the rest, but now as I have started with the last book, which takes place in the first part of his life, should I continue with "Factotum" isn't that the next step in his life?
Does it matter? Doesn't really matter. Do what you feel. I read them all out of order. Purple Stickpin. Thing about Buk is that his literary forms were so distinct. The novels are all about his experience, and the poems are surprisingly similar to the novels. You can burn through his novels in a fairly short period of time, so you may want to save a couple I've read each of them three or four times over the past 20 years for later. As Elise posted, it really doesn't matter in terms of chronology, as you can clearly tell what part of his life he is writing about.
Maybe try the poem. Again, many of them read like short novel chapters. I highly recommend "Burning in Water, Drowning in Flame" from It collects three of his early out-of-print works as well as some post-Mockingbird poems. Great stuff. To me, the short stories are the weakest I use this term very relatively of his material, but don't think that they aren't good, and even great at times.
Every word he wrote was important. Ninjaspliff said:. These guys were right. It doesn't really matter. Good start. I - personally - think, 'Post Office' would be a great choice to continue. That's because I find 'Factotum' weaker.
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