The first book I read from an American author was “Tropic of Cancer” by Henry Miller where he freely writes about his bohemian lifestyle during his stay in Paris, France between 1930 and 1934. I was 16 years old and needed to stay in the hospital because of a broken upper thigh. I was so stupid to ski like a rowdy and crashed into a floodlight pole in an exact angle of 90° what made it easy for the pole to break my thigh. Physics you know. The book was given to me by a friend who was some years older and loved literature like this.
I started to be fascinated by authors like Miller. And for sure I did not wait to read Bukowski. Some people call him a sexist and a vulgar drunk head. And this is exactly what he was. And the people who read his books are exactly these people who criticise him. The other people who like to read his stuff are people like me. Having had a dream to become a Rock Star, his life style was simply a template for living for me and my friends in the late 90’s and early 2000’s. But on the other hand, Bukowski or Klaus Kinski are people who went through shit - for which they were responsible themselves - and found a way to stay like they are and make the shit to something valuable. I like that. I like controversial people like them.
The book I am reading now is “The Bell tolls for No One”. The best description I could find is from Goodreads:
From the self-illustrated, unpublished work written in 1947 to hardboiled contributions to 1980s adult magazines, The Bells Tolls for No One presents the entire range of Bukowski’s talent as a short story writer, from straight-up genre stories to postmodern blurring of fact and fiction. An informative introduction by editor David Stephen Calonne provides historical context for these seemingly scandalous and chaotic tales, revealing the hidden hand of the master at the top of his form.
I like short story’s as I often read before falling asleep. These days I also hear audiobooks. But the crap with them is, that I always fall asleep after some minutes. So “The Bell talls for No One” is simply perfect for that situation. And as always it is tremendously awesome to have the ability to look into Bukowski’s soul with all it’s dark sides.
Why am I loving these literature? Because it is “nothing”. It is simply the view to someones way of living, his soul and his thoughts. Reading business books (what I do a lot), books about our environment, about people and about history (what I do also a lot) or technical books (what I did a lot but don’t do nowadays anymore) is demanding and exhausting. I always need to take notes while reading or mark stuff in the pages (like Ryan Holiday is doing). But reading Bukowski, Miller, Orwell or also Hemingway is, at least for me, relaxing and pure joy.
Give it a try by yourself. Maybe you start with “The bell tolls for No One”.
