Bukowski
was disgusting, his actual real fiction is awful, he’s been called a
misogynist, overly simplistic, the worst narcissist, (and probably all
of the above are true to an extent) and whenever there’s a collection of
“Greatest American Writers” he’s never included.
And yet… he’s probably the greatest American writer ever. Whether
you’ve read him or not, and most have not, there’s 6 things worthy of
learning from an artist like Bukoswski.
I consider “Ham on Rye” by Bukowski probably the greatest American
novel ever written. It’s an autobiographical novel (as are all his
novels except “Pulp” which is so awful it’s unreadable) about his
childhood, being beaten by his parents, avoiding war, and beginning his
life of destitution, hardship, alcoholism, and the beginnings of his
education as a writer.
I’m almost embarrassed to admit he’s an influence. Many people hate
him and I’m much more afraid of being judged than he ever was.
1) Honesty. His first four novels are extremely
autobiographical. He details the suffering he had as a child (putting
his parents in a very bad light but he didn’t care), he details his
experiences with prostitutes, his lack of interest in holding down a
job, his horrible experiences and lack of real respect for the women he
was in relationships with, and on and on. His fiction and poetry
document thoroughly the people he hates, the authors he despises, the
establishment he could care less about (and he hated the
anti-establishment just as much. One quote about a potential plan the
hippie movement was going to do: “Run a pig for president? What the fuck
is that? It excited them. It bored me.”) Most fiction writers do what fiction writers do: they make stuff up.
They tell stories that come from their imagination. Bukowski wasn’t
really able to do that. Whenever he attempted fiction (his last novel
being a great example) it fell flat. Even his poetry is non-fiction.
There’s one story he wrote (I forget the name) where he’s sitting in a
bar and he wants to be alone and some random guy starts talking to him:
“its horrible about all those girls who were burned” and Bukowski says
(I’m getting the words a little off. Doing this from memory), “I don’t
know.” And the guy and everyone else in the bar starts yelling, “This
guy doesn’t care that all those little girls burned to death”. But
Bukowski was honest, “It was a newspaper headline. If it happened in
front of me I’d probably feel different about it.” And he refused to
back down and stayed in the bar until closing time.
(Matt Dillon playing a young Bukowski in "Factotum")
He had very few boundaries as to how far his honesty could go. He
never wrote about his daughter after she reached a certain age. That’s
about the only boundary I can find. Every other writer has so many
things they can’t write about: family, spouses, exes, children, jobs,
bosses, colleagues, friends. That’s why they make stuff up. Bukowski
didn’t let himself get hampered by that so we see real raw honest, a
real anthropological survey of being down and out for 60+ years without
anything being held back. No other writer before or since has done that.
For a particular example, see his novel, “Women” which detailed every
sexual nuance of every woman who dared to sleep with him after he
achieved some success. Most of these women were horrified after the book
came out.
I try as hard as possible to remove all boundaries. But it’s a challenge with each post I do.
2) Persistence. Bukowski got two stories
published when he was young (24 and 26 years old) but almost all of his
stories were rejected by publishers. So he quit writing for ten years.
Then, in the mid 1950s he started up again. He submitted tons of poems
and stories everywhere he could. It took him years to get published. It
took him even more years to get really noticed. And it finally took him
about 15 years of writing every day and writing thousands of poems and
stories before he finally started making a living as a writer. He wrote his first novel at the age of 49 and it was financially successful. After 25 years of plugging away at it he was finally a successful writer.
25 years!
Most people give up much earlier, much younger. Both my grandfather
and father wanted to be musicians, for instance. Both gave up in their
20s and 30s and took what they thought was the safer route. (The safer
route being, in my opinion, what ultimately killed both of them).
And this persistence was while he was going through three marriages,
dozens of jobs, and non-stop alcoholism. Some of this is documented
(poorly) in the move “Barfly” but I think a better movie about Bukowski
is the indie that Matt Dillon did about his novel, “Factotum” which
details the 10 years he was going from job to job, woman to woman, just
trying to survive as an alcoholic in a world that kept beating him down.
He wrote his first novel in 19 days. Michael Hemmingson who I write
about below, wrote me and said Bukowski had to finish that novel so fast
because he was desperately afraid he was going to be a failure at being
a successful writer and didn’t want to disappoint John Martin, who had
essentially given him an advance for the novel.
(a tattoo of the epitaph on Bukowski's tombstone)
3) Survival. When I think “constant alcoholic” I
usually equate that with being a homeless bum. Bukowski, at some deep
level, realized that he needed to survive. He couldn’t just be a
homeless bum and kill himself, no matter how many disappointments he
had. He worked countless factory jobs (the basis of the non-fiction
novel, “Factotun”) but even that wasn’t stable enough for him. Finally,
he took a job working for the US Government (you can’t get more stable)
working in the post office for 11 years. He didn’t miss child support
payments (although he constantly wrote about how ugly the mother of his
child was), and as far as I know he was never homeless or totally down
and out from his early 30s ’til the time he started having success as a
writer.
And despite writing about the overwhelming poverty he had, he did
have a small inheritance from his father, a savings account he built up,
and a steady paycheck. The post office job is documented, in full, in
his first “novel” called, appropriately, “Post Office”. Many people
think that’s his best novel but I put it third or fourth behind “Ham on
Rye” and “Factotum” and possibly “Women”. He also wrote a novel,
“Hollywood” about the blow-by-blow experience of doing the movie
“Barfly”. All the names are changed (hence its claim to be fiction) but
once you figure out who everyone is, its totally non-fiction. Like all
of his other novels (not counting “Pulp”, which was the worst American
novel ever written and published).
[See, 33 Unusual Ways to Be a Better Writer – many tips I got from reading his books.]
4) Discipline. Imagine working a brutal 10 hour
shift at the Post Office, coming home and arguing with your wife or
girlfriend, or half-girlfriend, half-prostitute that was living with
you, finishing off three or four six-packs of beer and then…writing. He
did it every day. Most people want to write that novel, or finish that
painting, or start that business, but have zero discipline to actually
sit down and do it. If there was any talent that Bukowski had that I
can’t actually figure out how he got it, its that discipline.
When he was younger (early 20s, late teens) he spent almost every day
in the library, falling in love with all the great writers. The love
must have been so great it superseded almost everything else in his
life. He had to write like them or he really felt like he would die. He
had to “put down a good line” as he would say. And every day he would
try. And good, bad, or ugly, he probably ultimately ended up publishing
(many posthumously) everything he ever wrote. I try to match that
discipline. Even when I don’t post a blog post I write seven days a
week, every morning. At least 1000 words and a completed post. I used to
do this in my 20s when I was trying to write fiction. My minimum then
was 3000 words. I did that for five years.
It adds up. The average book is 60,000 words. If you can write 1000
words a day then you’ll have 6 books by the end of the year. Because
poetry books are much smaller, Bukowski probably had around 80 or so
books published by the time he was dead and I bet there are more coming.
(his first novel at age 49. You're never too old).
5) His “literary map”. He was inspired by
several writers and he inspired many more. Some of my favorite writers
come from both categories. He was probably most inspired by three
writers: Celine, Knut Hamsun, and John Fante. I highly recommend
Celine’s “Journey to the End of the Night”. Celine is almost a more raw
version of Bukowski. He was constantly angry and trying to survive and
do whatever it took to survive. The thing about Bukowski, as opposed to
many other writers, is he didn’t concern himself with flowery images or
beautiful sunsets. He totally wrote as if he were speaking to you and
Celine does that to an extreme but he’s so raw and smart that the way he
“speaks” is like an insane person trying to spew out as much venom as
possible. 600 pages later his first book is a masterpiece and I often
use it in my pre-writing hour every morning when I read stuff to inspire
myself to write.
John Fante wrote the underappreciated “Ask the Dust” which was
completely forgotten until Bukowski’s publisher republished it and all
of Fante’s books. (I also recommend the movie with Colin Farrell and a
naked Salma Hayek).
(maybe Hayek's best role)
Bukowski was almost afraid to admit how much Fante directly
influenced him. He wrote in one “short story”, “I realized that
admitting John Bante had been such a great influence on my writing might
detract from my own work, as if part of me was a carbon copy, but I
didn’t give a damn. It’s when you hide things that you choke on them.”
Note he spelled “Fante” as “Bante”. That’s the extent of Bukowski’s
fiction. Another interesting thing is the last line. Nothing flowery,
nothing descriptively beautiful, yet a line like that is what made
Bukowski unique and one of the best writers ever, getting at the hidden
truth of what was really happening in his head, rather than telling yet
another boring story filled with flowery descriptions like most books
and stories are.
Then there’s the authors Bukowski influenced. Michael Hemmingson
wrote an excellent review of Bukowski in the book “The Dirty Realism
Duo: Bukowski and Carver” which I highly recommend. Raymond Carver comes
from the same genre of down-and-out, oppressive relationships that were
beyond his ability to cope with them, and realist, simple writing that
was mostly autobiographical (although that’s a little less clear in
Carver’s case). I’d also throw Denis Johnson’s book of short stories
(Jesus’ Son) in that category (Johnson studied with Carver) and more
recently, books like the above-mentioned Michael Hemmingson’s “Crack
Hotel”, “The Comfort of Women”, “My Date(Rape) with Kathy Acker” and
other stories. I’m dying to find other writers in this category.
(I haven't seen the movie. Is it good?)
I read how Denis Johnson needed $10,000 to pay the IRS. So he threw
together some vignettes he had forgotten about, called the collection
“Jesus’ Son” and sent it off to Jonathan Galassi and said, “here, you
can have these if you pay the IRS”. So I Facebook-friended Galassi and
asked him if he could tell me one author in Denis Johnson’s league but
I’m still waiting for a response.
I wish I could find more writers like these. Perhaps William Vollmann
who wrote “Butterfly Stories” but his bigger fiction is too difficult
for me to read (anecdote: he wrote the afterward to the recently
re-published Celine’s “Journey of the Night” so all of these writers
tend to recognize their common lineage.)
6) Poetry. I really hate poetry. When I open up
the New Yorker (blecch!) and read the latest poems in there I can’t
understand them, they all seem like gibberish to me, they all seem too
intellectual. And yet, out of all the poets I’ve read, the only ones I
really like are: Bukowski, Raymond Carver, and Denis Johnson. Poetry
allowed them to master making each word in a sentence effective and
powerful. It was this training that allowed them to destroy the
competition when they sat down to write their longer pieces. It makes me
want to try my hand at poetry but even the word “poetry” sounds so
pseudo-intellectual I just have no interest in doing it.
Bukowski: Alcoholic, postal worker, misogynist (there’s a video you
can easily find on Youtube where he must be almost 60 and he literally
kicks his wife in anger while he’s being interviewed.), anti-war,
anti-peace, anti-everything, hated everyone, probably insecure,
extremely honest, and he had to write every day or it would kill him.
In his own words, words which I hope to live by: “What a joy it must
be to be a truly great writer, even if it means a shotgun at the
finish”.
———————— Suggested Reading:
Poem: “You Don’t know What Love Is (an evening with Bukowski)” by Raymond Carver. Article: John Fante, father of LA Literature: Movies:
“Factotum”
If anyone can think of anybody else in this specific “dirty
realism” category, please put it in the comments. I’d also like to read
women in this category but I think it’s a particularly male category.
Jack Kerouac falls somewhere in there but he’s more “beat” which I think
is different. And Chad Kultgen’s recent books (“The Average American
Male”, for instance) are also somewhat in the realism category but not
quite “dirty” enough.
Hallucinations. Vivid images. Intense sounds. Greater self-awareness.
Those
are the hallmark effects associated with the world's four most popular
psychedelic drugs. Ayahuasca, DMT, MDMA and psilocybin mushrooms can all
take users through a wild mind-bending ride that can open up your
senses and deepen your connection to the spirit world. Not all trips are
created equal, though – if you're sipping ayahuasca, your high could
last a couple of hours. But if you're consuming DMT, that buzz will last
under than 20 minutes.
Still, no matter the length of the high, classic psychedelics are
powerful. Brain imaging studies have shown that all four drugs have
profound effects on neural activity. Brain function is less constrained
while under the influence, which means you're better able to emotion.
And the networks in your brain are far more connected, which allows for a
higher state of consciousness and introspection.
These
psychological benefits have led researchers to suggest that psychedelics
could be effective therapeutic treatments. In fact, many studies have
discovered that all four drugs, in one way or another, have the
potential to treat depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder,
addiction and other mental health conditions. By opening up the mind,
the theory goes, people under the influence of psychedelics can confront
their painful pasts or self-destructive behavior without shame or fear.
They're not emotionally numb; rather, they're far more objective.
Of
course, these substances are not without their side effects. But
current research at least suggests that ayahuasca, DMT, MDMA and
psilocybin mushrooms have the potential to change the way doctors can
treat mental illness – particularly for those who are
treatment-resistant. More in-depth studies are needed to understand
their exact effects on the human brain, but what we know now is at least
promising. Here, a look at how each drug affects your brain – and how
that's being used to our advantage.
AyahuascaAyahuasca is an ancient plant-based tea derived from a combination of the vine Banisteriopsis caapi and the leaves of the plant psychotria viridis.
Shamans in the Amazon have long used ayahuasca to cure illness and tap
into the spiritual world. Some religious groups in Brazil consume the
hallucinogenic brew as religious sacrament. In recent years, regular
folk have started to use ayahuasca for greater self-awareness.
That's
because brain scans have shown that ayahuasca increases the neural
activity in the brain's visual cortex, as well as its limbic system –
the region deep inside the medial temporal lobe that's responsible for
processing memories and emotion. Ayahuasca can also quiet the brain's
default mode network, which, when overactive, causes depression, anxiety
and social phobia, according to a video released last year by YouTube channel AsapSCIENCE. Those who consume it end up in a meditative state.
"Ayahuasca
induces an introspective state of awareness during which people have
very personally meaningful experiences," says Dr. Jordi Riba, a leading
ayahuasca researcher. "It's common to have emotionally-laden,
autobiographic memories coming to the mind's eye in the form of visions,
not unlike those we experience during sleep."
According to Riba,
people who use ayahuasca experience a trip that can be "quite intense"
depending on the dose consumed. The psychological effects come on after
about 45 minutes and hit their peak within an hour or two; physically,
the worst a person will feel is nausea and vomiting, Riba says. Unlike
with LSD or psilocybin mushrooms, people high on ayahuasca are fully
aware that they're hallucinating. It's this self-conscious tripping that
has led people to use ayahuasca as a means to overcome addiction and
face traumatic issues. Riba and his research group at Hospital do Sant
Pau in Barcelona, Spain, have also begun "rigorous clinical trials"
using ayahuasca for treating depression; so far, the plant-based drug
has shown to reduce depressive symptoms in treatment-resistant patients,
as well as produce "a very antidepressant effect that is maintained for
weeks," says Riba, who has studied the drug with support from the
Beckley Foundation, a U.K.-based think tank.
His team is
currently studying the post-acute stage of ayahuasca effects – what
they've dubbed the "after-glow." So far, they've found that, during this
"after-glow" period, the regions of the brain associated with
sense-of-self have a stronger connection to other areas that control
autobiographic memories and emotion. According to Riba, it's during this
time that the mind is more open to psychotherapeutic intervention, so
the research team is working to incorporate a small number of ayahuasca
sessions into mindfulness psychotherapy.
"These functional
changes correlate with increased 'mindfulness' capacities," Riba says.
"We believe that the synergy between the ayahuasca experience and the
mindfulness training will boost the success rate of the
psychotherapeutic intervention."
DMTAyahuasca and the compound N,N-Dimethyltryptamine – or DMT – are closely linked. DMT is present in the leaves of the plant psychotria viridis
and is responsible for the hallucinations ayahuasca users experience.
DMT is close in structure to melatonin and serotonin and has properties
similar to the psychedelic compounds found in magic mushrooms and LSD.
If taken orally, DMT has no real effects on the body because stomach enzymes break down the compound immediately. But the Banisteriopsis caapi vines
used in ayahuasca block those enzymes, causing DMT to enter your
bloodstream and travel to your brain. DMT, like other classic
psychedelic drugs, affect the brain's serotonin receptors, which
research shows alters emotion, vision, and sense of bodily integrity. In other words: you're on one hell of a trip.
Much
of what is known about DMT is thanks to Dr. Rick Strassman, who first
published groundbreaking research on the psychedelic drug two decades ago.
According to Strassman, DMT is one of the only compounds that can cross
the blood-brain barrier – the membrane wall separating circulating
blood from the brain extracellular fluid in the central nervous system.
DMT's ability to cross this divides means the compound "appears to be a
necessary component of normal brain physiology," says Strassman, the
author of two quintessential books on the psychedelic, DMT: The Spirit Molecule and DMT and the Soul of Prophecy.
"The
brain only brings things into its confines using energy to get things
across the blood-brain barrier for nutrients, which it can't make on its
own — things like blood sugar or glucose," he continued. "DMT is unique
in that way, in that the brain expends energy to get it into its
confines."
DMT actually naturally occurs in the human body, and is
particularly present in the lungs. Strassman says it may also be found
in the pineal gland – the small part of the brain associated with the
mind's "third eye." The effects of overly active DMT when ingested via
ayahuasca can last for hours. But taken on its own – that is, smoked or
injected – and your high lasts only a few minutes, according to
Strassman.
Although short, the trip from DMT can be intense, more
so than other psychedelics, Strassman says. Users on DMT have reported
similar experiences to that of ayahuasca: A greater sense of self, vivid
images and sounds and deeper introspection. In the past, Strassman has
suggested DMT to be used as a therapy tool to treat depression, anxiety
and other mental health conditions, as well as aid with self-improvement
and discovery. But studies of DMT are actually scarce, so it's hard to
know the full extent of its therapeutic benefits.
"There isn't much research with DMT and it ought to be studied more," Strassman says.
MDMAUnlike DMT, MDMA is not a naturally occurring
psychedelic. The drug – otherwise called molly or ecstasy – is a
synthetic concoction popular among ravers and club kids. People can pop
MDMA as a capsule, tablet or pill. The drug (sometimes called ecstasy or
molly) triggers the release of three key neurotransmitters: serotonin,
dopamine and norepinephrine. The synthetic drug also increases levels of
the hormones oxytocin and prolactin, resulting in a feeling of euphoria
and being uninhibited. The most significant effect of MDMA is the
release of serotonin in large quantities, which drains the brain's
supply – which can mean days of depression after its use.
Brain
imaging has also shown that MDMA causes a decrease in activity in the
amygdala – the brain's almond-shaped region that perceives threats and
fear – as well as an increase in the prefrontal cortex, which is
considered the brain's higher processing center. Ongoing research on
psychedelic drugs and the effects on various neural networks has also
found that MDMA allows for more flexibility in brain function, which
means people tripping on the drug can filter emotions and reactions
without being "stuck in old ways of processing," according to Dr.
Michael Mithoefer, who has studied MDMA extensively.
"People are
less likely to be overwhelmed by anxiety and better able to process
experience … without being numb to emotion," he says.
Last year,
the U.S. Food and Drug Administration granted researchers permission to
move ahead with plans for a large-scale clinical trial to examine the
effects of using MDMA as treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder
(PTSD). Mithoefer oversaw the phase-two trials – backed by the
Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), an
American nonprofit founded in the mid-1980s – that informed the FDA's
decision. During the study, people living with PTSD were able to address
their trauma without withdrawing from their emotions while under the
influence of MDMA because of the complex interaction between the
amygdala and the prefrontal cortex. Since the phase two trials had
strong results, Mithoefer told Rolling Stone in December that he expects the FDA to approve the phase three trial plans sometime early this year.
While
research into MDMA's use for PTSD treatment is promising, Mithoefer
cautions that the drug not be used outside of a therapeutic setting, as
it raises blood pressure, body temperature and pulse, and causes nausea,
muscle tension, increased appetite, sweating, chills and blurred
vision. MDMA could also lead to dehydration, heart failure, kidney
failure and an irregular heartbeat. If someone on MDMA doesn't drink
enough water or has an underlying health condition, the side effects can
be life threatening.
Psilocybin MushroomsMushrooms are another
psychedelic with a long history of use in health and healing ceremonies,
particularly in the Eastern world. People tripping on 'shrooms will
experience vivid hallucinations within an hour of ingestion, thanks to
the body's breakdown psilocybin, the naturally-occurring psychedelic
ingredient found in more than 200 species of mushrooms. Research out of the Imperial College London,
published in 2014, found that psilocybin, a serotonin receptor, causes a
stronger communication between the parts of the brain that are normally
disconnected from each other. Scientists reviewing fMRI brain scans of
people who've ingested psilocybin and people who've taken a placebo
discovered that magic mushrooms trigger a different connectivity pattern
in the brain that's only present in a hallucinogenic state. In this
condition, the brain's functioning with less constraint and more
intercommunication; according to researchers from Imperial College
London, this type of psilocybin-induced brain activity is similar to what's seen with dreaming and enhanced emotional being.
"These
stronger connections are responsible for creating a different state of
consciousness," says Dr. Paul Expert, a methodologist and physicist who
worked on the Imperial College London study. "Psychedelic drugs are a
potentially very powerful way of understanding normal brain function."
Emerging
research may prove magic mushrooms effective at treating depression and
other mental health conditions. Much like ayahuasca, brain scans have shown
that psilocybin can suppress activity in the brain's default mode
network, and people tripping on 'shrooms have reported experiencing "a
higher level of happiness and belonging to the world," according to
Expert. To that end, a study published last year in the U.K. medical journal The Lancet discovered that a high dose of mushrooms reduced depressive symptoms in treatment-resistant patients.
That
same study noted that psilocybin could potentially treat anxiety,
addiction and obsessive-compulsive disorder because of its
mood-elevating properties. And other research has found that psilocybin can reduce the fear response in mice, signaling the drug's potential as a treatment for PTSD.
Despite these positive findings, research on psychedelics is limited, and consuming magic mushrooms does comes with some risk.
People tripping on psilocybin can experience paranoia or a complete
loss of subjective self-identity, known as ego dissolution, according to
Expert. Their response to the hallucinogenic drug will also depend on
their physical and psychological environment. Magic mushrooms should be
consumed with caution because the positive or negative effect on the
user can be "profound (and uncontrolled) and long lasting," Expert says.
"We don't really understand the mechanism behind the cognitive effect
of psychedelics, and thus cannot 100 percent control the psychedelic
experience." Correction: This article has been updated to clarify that Dr. Jordi Riba's work is supported by the Beckley Foundation, not MAPS.
