Bukowski, drinking

You can imagine how flattered, and indeed surprised we were to receive a package purporting to contain an original and as yet unpublished volume of work by that uncouth folk hero of the American literary landscape, Mr Henry Charles Bukowski.

Bukowski’s earthy masculine novels and plain verse poetry earned him the moniker ‘The Prince of the American Night’. While his violently unpretentious articulations of the apolitical anomie of the post-war American barfly gained him a loyal readership. Young women famously sent the writer graphic missives proffering their virginities, and burnt out old men would often turn up on his doorstep begging advice. The American literary landscape has been a duller place since his departure. Thus is is with sincere pride and insincere humility, we present the first new poem from Charles Bukowski in fifteen years.