Absence of the Hero: Uncollected Stories and Essays, Vol. 2: 1946–1992
By Charles Bukowski
Edited and with an introduction by David Calonne
City Lights Publishers
Say what you want about Charles Bukowski’s proper place in the history of literature—and many, many have, including, most frequently, the author himself—there’s no denying that the man was an energetic (and prolific) showman with style and humor to burn. This second volume of uncollected works, with a healthy ratio of wheat to chaff, backs up the case. The pieces range over nearly half a century, and include a story about a baseball player seized by a sudden bout of existential paralysis, along with early, graphically sexual (and masterfully comic) stories published in such smut mags as Candid Press. There are also essays on literary theory and poets loved and loathed by the author. Some of the literary essays bog down in ax-grinding, but mostly Bukowski hews tightly to the old adage about literature being meant to “entertain and instruct”—emphasizing the former to grease the skids for the latter.
