LAST CALL: The Bukowski Legacy Continues
© 2012 Lummox Press
ISBN 978-1-929878-86-4
$18
156 pages - Trade Paper- 6 X 9 inches
Edited by RD Armstrong - over 50 contributors
Available direct from Lummox via Pay Pal
New poems, stories & essays...the legacy grows!
or make check out to Lummox and send to
PO Box 5301 San Pedro, CA 90733-5301
$21 USA (includes shipping)
CONTRIBUTORS:
CC Russell, Pris Campbell, GH Hill, Michael C. Ford, Henry Denander, G. Murray Thomas, Ellaraine Lockie, Rebecca Morrison, Frank Reardon, Andrew Hilbert, Mende Smith, Mike Adams, Ben Smith, Mark Terrill, Doug Holder, HL Thomas, Charles Ries, John Dorsey, Father Luke, Jay Alamares, Michael Thompson, Bretton B. Holmes, Ian Rawkinrec, John Yamrus, Michael Lefanto, FN Wright, Gerry Niccosia, Joan Jobe Smith, Alan Catlin, Eric Djaeger, Bill Gainer, A.D. Winans, Doug Draime, Lawrence Welsh, Ed Jamieson Jr., Joe Speer, Joy Buckley, Jayne Lyn Stahl, Rick Smith, William Taylor Jr., Edward Field, Gerry Locklin, Isaac Edwards, Linda Lerner, Neeli Cherkovski, Michael Meloan, John Macker, Marc Olmstead, Alex Thiltges, Michael Basinski, D. A. Pratt, Anne Menebroker, Abel Debritto and RD Armstrong
Last Call: the Bukowski Legacy Continues
A collection of writing that demonstrates his profound influence on literature in the small press.
from the introduction by RD Armstrong...
Even though I read Buk
for years, almost up to the time of his death, it took me a long time to make
sense of him. Before that, I had just been studying...not learning.
Coincidentally, it was around this same time (the early ‘90s) that I also began
to write in a ‘voice’ that made sense to me. So, although I studied Buk for a
long time, I came late to this writing of THE POEM. Perhaps this is why I focus
so much on the words of the man, and so little on his deeds (or those of
his minions).
A lot of people don’t understand the premise of
this book (or the preceding version). They want to know why there isn’t any
Bukowski in a book about Bukowski. Well, that’s just it…it isn’t about the
legendary Bukowski, it’s about the influence of Bukowski on a generation of
writers who followed him into the trenches to write in their own particular
style. Before Bukowski became the legendary Bukowski, when he was just another
schmuck writing the not-so-great American novel, when he had a snowball’s chance
in hell of catching a break, he was like some of you; living with his dreams and
enjoying the fruits of his low-life, with no discernible future, hand to mouth,
paycheck to paycheck…the writing more of a distraction than a way out. I’m sure
that some of you readers know exactly what I’m talking about (I can’t be the
only one left who hasn’t been sucked into the great American Myth machine).
Maybe it’s our love of the underdog that makes us hold his miserable life up and celebrate it as if it was a beacon. He was the long shot who defied the odds and made it out alive. Every generation needs one, the oddball who manages to give the goon squad the slip; or the two-time loser who finally wins. But, really, that’s all just publicity to forward the career, isn’t it? The fans of Bukowski seem to love his laughable portrayal of the loser, the bum, the low man on the totem pole. The reality of all this is that he got out of his dead-end life as soon as he could, got a nice little house in San Pedro with a view of the harbor and a stones throw from a Catholic church up the hill.
REVIEW by Grady Harp
LAST CALL: THE BUKOWSKI LEGACY CONTINUES is yet another
issue from Lummox Press which is growing in respect as a publishing house
willing to deal with the at times darker, and at all times important aspects of
contemporary writing and thinking. This book is a collection of poems, short
stories and essays that have been informed by and reflect the very much alive
legacy of the writer Charles Bukowski. Note to those not wholly familiar with
this legend, the following biographical data will be useful: 'Henry Charles
Bukowski (born Heinrich Karl Bukowski; 1920 - 1994*) was an American poet,
novelist and short story writer. His writing was influenced by the social,
cultural and economic ambience of his home city of Los Angeles. It is marked by
an emphasis on the ordinary lives of poor Americans, the act of writing,
alcohol, relationships with women and the drudgery of work. Bukowski wrote
thousands of poems, hundreds of short stories and six novels, eventually
publishing over sixty books. In 1986 Time called Bukowski a "laureate of
American lowlife". Regarding Bukowski's enduring popular appeal, Adam Kirsch of
The New Yorker wrote, "the secret of Bukowski's appeal. . . [is that] he
combines the confessional poet's promise of intimacy with the larger-than-life
aplomb of a pulp-fiction hero."
What RD Armstrong has given us is first his own experience with the legacy of
'Buk' (as Bukowski is referred to by followers and friends), and the following
is an excerpt that explains his stance: "So in this book I have attempted,
again, to showcase a number of writers whose work shows the influences, not
necessarily in style or form, but in the feelings that their pieces (especially
true of poetry) provoke in the reader (or in the editor). Not too many reviewers
ever address the visceral quality of Bukowski's writing, which seems odd to me
since he was so fond of writing while listening to classical music, especially
the darker stuff. It is music that tugs on one's feelings, pulling the dark
undertones out and giving them a good shake. It is my opinion that Buk's poetry
does the same."
Some examples of the poems and stories RD Armstrong has compiled follow:
POEM by William Taylor, Jr.
the missing co-ed
is found dead
and the rent
is twelve days late
the milk has gone sour
and the sky is the color
of charcoal
and smells of
gasoline
heart disease
claims more lives
than cancer
these days
or maybe it's the
other way around
nobody knows how to
write a goddamned
song anymore
and the 21st century
was the dumbest thing
you ever bought
all the wars
you paid for are live
and in color
but the TV is broken
and the house,
the house is out of
whiskey again.
Or to insert one of RD Armstrong's own poems sort of ties it all together:
POETICS by RD Armstrong
Today in the checkout at Ralph's
The checker asks me
"Do you know Carlos Bukowski?"
Carlos I think?
I know a Charles Bukowski, why?
Please don't be insulted but
You remind me of him...
It's the week before Buk's
Ninetieth birthday
Even though he died almost
Twenty years ago
And plans to celebrate the
Glory that is everything Buk
Happen in Los Feliz this
Saturday night in a party
For the Bukowski faithful
And I
The forgotten
One of his ardent fans
Is being confused
For the old goat down
Here in Long Beach...
Yeah
I told the checker
I get that a lot
Me and Buk
Go way back
That's cool
She says
As she gives me
A deal on the Jif
Peanut butter I just bought
At last
My association with
Bukowski
Is finally paying off
This collection is brimming over with such jewels as this, poems and stories
that pull up the stage on which Bukowski lived and drank and caroused and
listened to Mahler and Bruckner et al and wrote. These works do not mimic or
plagiarize Buk, but they are most assuredly under his influence which seems to
grow more strong with the passage of time.
Grady Harp, February 2012
*Coincidently, Lummox Press was born the year Bukowski died...that says something about his influence right there!