Art charles bukowski biography

By David Daniel

Some of the most insightful and moving parts of the biography are Neeli Cherkovski’s personal recounting of his on-again off again relationship with Charles Bukowski.

Bukowski, A Life: The Centennial Edition by Neeli Cherkovski.

Black Sparrow Press, 376 pages, $18.95 (softcover).

When Ernest Hemingway was once asked to describe the best preparation for being a writer, he cracked, “an unhappy childhood.” Charles Bukowski stands as a testament to that truism.

“Fear made me a writer,” he said,  “fear and a lack of confidence.” This year marks the centennial of Bukowski’s birth and, along with a new documentary film (Arts Fusereview) and reissues of some of his numerous books, comes this illuminating biography.

Henry Charles Bukowski was born in 1920 in Andernach, Germany to a German mother and American G.I.

father who’d met in WW I. When he was three, the family returned to live in Los Angeles. A sullen and lonely child, Bukowski was teased in grammar school