Alcoholism - why didn't it destroy Bukowski?

Ambreen

Ambreen

Sordide Sentimental
plusljud said:
ever read post office?
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Yes, for the book club.
At last you posted ; I thought you won't appear anymore.

hank solo said:
Although Cardiff is in Wales and Olaf is talking about Glasgow, Scotland - I'd say that you'll see that sort of thing in many UK town and city centres on an average weekend.
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Here in Paris a prevention campaign against the specific problem of binge drinking has just been launched. In the news, they keep illustrating this phenomenon by showing reports set in UK.
My former best friends told me what she saw in the streets every time she went out by night during the weekends when she was staying in London. What I found the most startling were the girls she described : totally bedraggled, some semi-naked, lying on the ground, some even publicly pissing, etc.
 
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rjwink666

rjwink666

The UK problem stems also from the availability of alcohol, and the lack of limits and restrictions. Booze is very cheap, especially in Supermarkets, if you want a crate of beer, a couple of bottles of cheap wine and a small bottle of vodka then it will set you back not much more then twenty quid.

The Bars and Pubs need to compete with the shop prices (Pubs are closing at an alarming rate) so they offer deals, such as all you can drink for £15.

In many ways the UK is a haven for alcoholics.
 
Corndog

Corndog

Buk No Alcoholic

Great thread.

Buk was a functioning drunk! He self medicated and it saved him, inspired him, fed him. As a young man it must have really helped after his upbringing with that cun* of an old man....

In the UK there has always been a drinking culture. The restriction on too much drinking in the past were, cost and work! Many heavy drinkers worked in the old industries, ship building, Coal mining, Construction, the Steel industry, Iron Foundrys... but many other jobs like the Post, Painting & decorating, journalism priniting...etc Their drinking revolved or was controlled by their work regime...Many only drank at weekends, but binged from Friday Afternoon all day Saturday and Sunday.

I believe Buk worked nights at the post office and drank when he got home in the morning? I think Buk took more outta Alcohol then it ever took otta him!
Alcohol cost him some relationships...Lynda?

And Buk was tough, though he did mellow in the end.
 
pig ear press

pig ear press

Sometimes when my 'ordinary madness' gets a bit much, a bottle of wine levels things, and I smile again.
I always see two sides to Bukowski when he talks about his drinking, there is the romantic 'me against the world' writer peering out onto the street with a glass in hand, two fingers to the world; and then there is the loner, alienated against the world, staring at the shit in the bowl, gasping for air, but seeing that bottle as much of a necessity as that air he's gasping for.

They say your mortality is all in your genes anyway, so maybe Buk's genes were more hard wearing Lee Coopers than trendy wear at the knee Levis. Maybe in some irony his fathers genetic code was what kept the old mule going. Who knows.

Anyway, gotta run, there's three bottles of Merlot for a tenner at the local offie.....
 
Bruno Dante

Bruno Dante

Olaf said:
I'm not kidding. Glasgow has a horrific alcohol problem...
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You took my post too seriously Olaf. It was just a tongue-in-cheek reference to the way in which alcohol (and the abuse of it) is an everyday thing in Glasgow but at the same time it's not really always viewed as a problem because it's such a 'way of life'. I suppose you couldn't have realised that though. I'm from Newcastle so I know exactly what you're talking about regarding macho attitudes towards it, etc.
 
E

Eiselein

Well, that`s very easy. Most professional alcoholics that survive got at least one thing in their lives that`s even more important to them as drinkng. In Buks case it was writing, in Lemmys case it was music, in Richard Burtons acting and so on. Lose the only thing in life that matters to you and you are fuckin`gone.
 
jrhys

jrhys

Don't think its that simple. If Buk loved writing so much, why the "ten year drunk"? He stopped writing to focus on drinking full time. Although he did appear sporadically during that time, he had almost entirely stopped writing?
 
5:28am

5:28am

Uh, i'm just pulling this out of my butt here, but I from what I remember his "10 year drunk" was really only about 2 years, and he didn't stop writing, he simply wrote much less than usual. If my memory is correct, this happened when Jane died.
 
BukFan Brad

BukFan Brad

mjp said:
What's a cun*? I can't keep up with British slang. Your Mersey beat and your lorries. It's like Chinese.
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I think he means 'cunt'. But I don't think Buk's old man was a complete cunt, maybe half a cunt. After all, he did give Buk blood credits at the charity hospital when he was haemorrhaging to death. A complete cunt of a father would've just let Buk die.
 
zenarus

zenarus

There seems to be many definitions of what an alcoholic is. Take your pick.
To some its anybody who likes to get drunk. To others its not being able to stop once you start.
Then there's having to stop and not being able to.
You're an alcoholic, " if you say so"...
 
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