I agree Karl
(and I LOVE "Living AND Dead"!)
Rene is one in a zillion.

Rene is our Bukowski. The ups and downs, the wild violence, the sensitive glimmers in the swill. My last reading at Chez Asada was, strangely enough, a revival of Renee's own bluebird story... the bluebird rotting...

I recollect when Johnny and Chichi didn't even want him to come to Jackie. He loved to scream abuse at the performers on the stage. Not to mention probably drinking up the bar. And that man NEVER pays for a drink. Thank you.

I once went to see "I Puritani" with him at the Metropolitan and he heckled the diva for not being as good as Callas. I'm shocked we were not thrown out. You can heckle like that in Italy... but anyhow, Rene screaming "POVERA" and other insults in Italian amidst the mummified rich audience was a bracing experience

The Bukowski documentary "Born Into This" tells you alot about the old man. (A must-get on Netflix, not to mention one to buy...)
"Hank" was wildly prolific. He went to his boring Post Office job (at night), came home, slept, woke up, started drinking and wrote. Then back to the job. That's all he did.

His publisher, John Martin, basically started the Black Sparrow press to publish the man. He agreed to give the poet $100. a month to live on -- that's all he needed -- if he would quit his PO job and write full time.

He started paying Bukowski on January 2, 1970. In the documentary, he details how he casually mentions to Hank that novels sell better than books of poems. On January 25th, the poet called him and said he had a novel for him: it was "Post Office."

John Martin asked - "How in hell did you write a novel in 22 days?" Bukowski's answer:

"Fear."

This message has been edited. Last edited by: S'tan,

Now this is instructive because he was essentially living a poem. You can't do that and be living the way other humans do. You have to be listening to the earth that is going to bury you.

Now Allen Ginsberg's Collected Poems have been published in full, from nascent period to death. I wonder if I should buy it though because I have the poems in the book from all the other books he published! Maybe I should for sentimental reasons.

Seven, rent "Born Into This" for the full-blooded experience of the life of Bukowski.

It is a compilation of many films... Right in the beginning he calmly tells one shooter he is going to throw his beer-bottle in his face. the guy asks why. And the poet says, "I'm too strong for you. You came too late. The cameras came too late."

But there is really no rancour. Just saying when he really wanted fame, it wasn't there. Now it comes and he is just his sublime self with few needs.

Some artists become their subject matter, and it can be a curse.

That's my problem, I write about myself too much, that is MY curse! Who gives a shit about what I have to say right?! LOL!

quote:

LOL!

Logorrea Laughter

Blah ha ha ha blah

Ha ha ha. Blah blah

Ha ha ha ha ha. Blah!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: MessyMessy Andrea Bicsotti,

What are you on?

I definitely recommend buying it. There's nothing like having all of his poems in one hard bound volume.