The poetry and prose of Charles Bukowski shines iridescent like sun-swept cellophane. His legendary persona as the unemployable, derelict-alcoholic-poet, the saint of Los Angeles, roving, reckoning, and raving on the city streets, continues to captivate, mesmerize, and inspire. With iconoclastic vision and stylistic originality, Bukowski scratches away at an eerily squeaky-clean surface to reveal the grisly disconnect between the American dream and bitter reality.
Indeed, Bukowski provides a powerful perspective. He painstakingly dissects the figure of America and revels in the gory aftermath: the primal drives, the blatant contradictions, the glorified stupidity, the inevitable doom, the meaningful meaninglessness, the subtle beauty, complexities and madness. . . . In the end, he leaves readers with sense of visceral sympathy, a simultaneous and endless love and pity for humanity.
Bukowski’s Poetry
Bukowski began writing poetry at the age of 35. Comparable to Henry Miller or Beat writers such as Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and William S. Burroughs, Bukowski wrote a sort of autobiographical fiction, using his own life as direct material for his art. The personal nature of his poetry and prose demonstrates a bleak disillusionment countered with an unbending perseverance. His uniquely unadulterated style conveys a life of resilient endurance.
Bukowski continued writing poetry and prose until his death. He often used the city of Los Angeles, where he lived the majority of his life, and its inhabitants for creative inspiration. He witnessed the depths and the zeniths of humanity from the sidewalks and distilled his vision and understanding into print.
Putrefaction
Found in the collection, The Pleasures of the Damned: Poems, 1951-1993 (HarperCollins, 2007), Bukowski’s poem, “putrefaction,” shows insight into his perspective on social progress. The first stanza of the poem follows:
of late
I’ve had this thought
that this country
has gone backwards
4 or 5 decades
and that all the
social advancement
the good feeling of
person toward
person
has been washed
away
and replaced by the same
old
bigotries. (100)
Literary Themes and Interpretations
One of the major themes that a reader can take away from this poem is tolerance. It’s as if Bukowski sighs in disgust at the habitual social relapses of American “bigotries.” In a time before America’s omnipresent political correctness, Bukowski emphasizes the damage caused by unfair prejudice.
Today we have coined terms for a variety of forms of discrimination: racism, ableism, ageism, anti-Semitism, classism, sexism, homophobia, and heterosexism, just to name a few. Focusing on differences and fear, individuals promote hatred and pain. Bukowski viewed these aftereffects first hand in the faces of his fellow citizens. He transformed his and their sorrow into extraordinary poetry.
Source:
Bukowski, C. (2008). The Pleasures of the Damned: Poems, 1951-1993. New York: HaperCollins.
William Padgett - Will received his Master's in Literature from Texas State University-San Marcos, where he focused on Southwestern Literature. He currently ...
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