Justin Hyde ...

hank solo

hank solo

Just practicin' steps and keepin' outta the fights
Moderator
Founding member
Whether or not Justin Hyde is the next Bukowski, well, I don't know. Maybe he's the next Marc*s J*hns*n. Oh I hope not. I see this book was published by the above site as the winner of their Jack Micheline Memorial contest. And the reviewer is also a member of The Guild of Outsider Writers. Of course, that doesn't mean anything.

But I think the reviewer dismisses Bukowski's work too easily. Maybe he doesn't like Bukowski, thinks he's over-rated or maybe he's just really enthusiastic about this new book by the other fellow. I see on his own website (the reviewer Paul Corman-Roberts) has a blurb from Neeli Cherkovski. How nice.
 
HarryC13

HarryC13

RIP
Thanks for sharing. I have mixed feelings. This Justin Hyde fellow writes well enough, from the samples in the review. Not enough there to compare him to Buk one way or another, but I'm interested enough to look for more. And hank solo is right, the reviewer is too dismissive of Bukowski. I don't know where he got something about Buk "claiming to affect the ignorance of the commoner" -- I just think he's off base with that comment. And Hyde's verses:

but sometimes like bukowski
you talk out of your asshole

As we on this site know, Bukowski freely admitted any number of times that he "talked out of his asshole" and in fact was an asshole. Sometimes I think it comes with the territory of being a writer.

What Corman-Roberts doesn't get that Bukowski is a damned good writer, not just some cultural icon. Those of us who read him 30+ years ago couldn't read him because he was famous, because he wasn't. But word of mouth gets around, and his reputation grew. He was good, he didn't bullshit, and he wrote with honesty.

Anyone who has edited in the small press knows that you see a lot of crap. It's been too long to remember how much crap Buk sent me, but I'm sure I rejected more of his work than I accepted. (It's a very weird feeling, 23 years later, to think about that.) I'm sure Justin Hyde writes his share of bad stuff too. Anyone who writes does.

Fortunately, we are in a position to sit here and see what happens. Personally, I think Justin Hyde and Bukowski and W.S. Merwin and who knows how many more poets can exist in the same pantheon.
 
jmoshea

jmoshea

I have been reading Hyde's work for some time now. He is definitely one of the better, more consistently interesting poets in the small press. Too bad everyone has to be compared to Buk...definitely unfair in my opinion...though in this review he is compared very favorably.

I would say we would need to wait and see what Justin or any new poet does over a ten or more year span before we compare them to Buk.

As for talking out of their ass...every poet does it...some more often than others.
 
mjp

mjp

Founding member
The problem is people continue to look for the "next Bukowski," which is kind of like looking for the next Beatles. Don't hold your breath. The middle part of the 20th century was a time of major change and re-creation for all of the arts, and it is not a period that we will likely see again for a long, long time.

Anyway, looking for the "next Bukowski" implies trying to replace him, and that's a pointless effort. The next Bukowski will not write the way Bukowski did, or the way Justin Hyde does. The next Bukowski will not fit in to the current accepted literary standards. Most of us will not enjoy - or be tolerant of - his or her work. It will certainly not read like anything around today.

And the author will not bother trying to build their own personal Bukowski-lite myth, the way that so many imitators do. They will create something new, and that's what will make them the next Bukowski.
 
Short Bus

Short Bus

When the F did Nietzche say know the common man-he hated the common man called them flies in the marketplace.

Next....
 
jmoshea

jmoshea

mjp said:
The next Bukowski will not fit in to the current accepted literary standards. Most of us will not enjoy - or be tolerant of - his or her work. It will certainly not read like anything around today.

And the author will not bother trying to build their own personal Bukowski-lite myth, the way that so many imitators do. They will create something new, and that's what will make them the next Bukowski.
Click to expand...

Yes, yes and yes.
 
HarryC13

HarryC13

RIP
I like the way you think, Michael. The forces that shaped Bukowski -- personal, literary and global -- are an unlikely combination. I mean, back in the 70s and early 80s a lot of us tried to live that hard-drinking Bohemian lifestyle, but hey -- I didn't live on the streets or in little rooms. Or hemmorhage and go right back to drinking. Bukowski lived an odd life, and that and his talent gave us the anomaly that he is.

And good point, Jimmy Snerp, since when was Nietzsche a lover of the common man?
 
chicagoburgers

chicagoburgers

mjp said:
The problem is...
Click to expand...

just had to say that the above quote, and Father Luke's below are 2 of the most 'right on' Buk assessments I've ever read.
Well done and well said.
---
03-20-2008, 10:10 AM #6
Father Luke

"What strikes me is that Bukowski broke open
everything he knew about what poetry was, and
made it his own. He made poetry something he
wanted to read.

Bukowski was an innovator. He knew his field, and
he stepped up, and walked to the front of the line with a:

Here I am. I will be counted among you fuckers.

Not many have that. Not many have the ability to
transcend their history. He had that. He knew his
history. He knew who those fuckers were. He'd
read them, he'd studied them.

And, eventually, he knew himself as among them.
History has given him a place, I believe, for his innovation,
and his clear voice. It came with quite a price. "
 
Gerard K H Love

Gerard K H Love

Appreciate your friends
It's great to get excited and enjoy things, but sometimes we ruin it by comparing it to other things. I over analyze stuff all the time. I need to just do it and enjoy. I know I liked the couple of verses in that blog and I laughed out loud at what Hank solo wrote.

I learned something and I can relate to most of the thread. Justin Hyde has his whole life in front of him to be a great artist just being "the" Justin Hyde and we spelled his name right.
 
cirerita

cirerita

Founding member
Bukowski was liked -and quite a lot by academics and underground figures- in the very early days (late 50's / early 60's)...

We all know there will be no next Bukowski.

It's All One Poem.
 
PaulFowler

PaulFowler

Its the nature of mainstream and avant garde art. Bukowski was part of the avant garde and eventually (and necessarily) became assimilated into mainstream art. His poetry starts out as a comment on the mainstream, but eventually becomes part of the mainstream. For a poet to become the "next Bukowski" then, they must too break down those poetics that dominate mainstream poetry; that is to say, the stylistic tendencies of Bukowski that appear to dominate much of the poetry of today. So, the "new Bukowski" must work with Bukowski in order to understand the modes of poetics that need breaking down and exposing, just as Bukowski worked with and against the modernists.

The next Bukowski will not look, smell or feel like Bukowski but he/she will certainly taste like him. Or something like that, I'm pretty tired but you should get what I mean.
 
Gerard K H Love

Gerard K H Love

Appreciate your friends
You should get an "A" for this. I am marking that down.
PaulFowler said:
The next Bukowski will not look, smell or feel like Bukowski but he/she will certainly taste like him. Or something like that, I'm pretty tired but you should get what I mean.
Click to expand...
Thank you but I'm not gonna taste anyone just yet.;)
 
vodka

vodka

Miss Take
i agree with cirerita. there just can't be a next bukowski. it's sort of like asking who will be the next jesus.

each poet can only be the next themselves.
 
roni

roni

cirerita said:
We all know there will be no next Bukowski.
Click to expand...

true.
and who would want any 'next Bukowski'? i think we're fine with the one we have.

(thinking back to the mid 70s, when the US-music-industry was so much looking for 'the next Bob Dylan' - and two of their official 'candidates' turned out to be too unique to fullfill their needs. i'm talking about one Tom and one Bruce of course.)
 
mjp

mjp

Founding member
roni said:
(thinking back to the mid 70s, when the US-music-industry was so much looking for 'the next Bob Dylan' - and two of their official 'candidates' turned out to be too unique to fullfill their needs. i'm talking about one Tom and one Bruce of course.)
Click to expand...
Tom Cruise and Bruce Willis? ;)

Lester Bangs called Bruce Springsteen, "The rich man's Bob Seeger," which always made me laugh (and is pretty close to the truth -- like all well done humor).
 
1fsh2fsh

1fsh2fsh

I think that I think too much
Founding member
Jimmy Snerp said:
MY friends and I have have a rule that if we hear Bob Seeger in a bar we have to down the drink and leave-
Click to expand...

Hey, I think that I will make that my rule too! Seegar played at a couple of my Jr. High school dances,(yep, really) probably '64,or '65. man thats too long to be listening to anybody...
 
Purple Stickpin

Purple Stickpin

Bob Seeger and Bruce Springsteen. So many fuckers worshiped them in High School. I always referred to them as the BS brothers. If you want to reside in High School for the rest of your life, you've found your niche. I swear that Bruce is still 17, and his music clearly states it. How many times can you write a song about banging a girl in the back seat of your parent's car, or wanting to to bang a girl in the back seat of your parent's car? God, he's as annoying as a dung-drop that doesn't quite want to happen.

Just add a black saxophone player and it's cool, right?:rolleyes:
 
Top