As mentioned two or three times I got to know Charles Bukowski a little bit in ‘ 87. This was during the post-production period on Barbet Schroeder‘s Barfly, which I wrote the press kit for.

I visited, drank with and “interviewed” Bukowski (sans notes, Truman Capote-style) in his Long Beach home sometime around…I don’t know, maybe March or April or even May. Barfly opened on 10.16.87.

Barbet made me rewrite the press kit over and over and over, so much so that I couldn’t read it after the tenth or twelfth revision. I came to hate hat press kit, but you know what? It’s one of the most tightly composed pieces of writing I’ve ever authored.

All to say that somewhere during this period I experienced by very first reading of Bukowski’s “The Laughing Heart,” which I loved. Not as much as “The Genius of the Crowd” but still.