
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, March 10, 1994                   TAG: 9403100146
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times
DATELINE: LOS ANGELES                                LENGTH: Medium

WRITER BUKOWSKI DIES AT 73

Charles Bukowski, the prolific writer and poet laureate of Los Angeles low-life whose rough-hewn autobiographical poems, short stories, novels and 1987 film "Barfly" chronicled his hard-bitten alcoholic youth, died Wednesday. He was 73.

Bukowski, a cult favorite in Europe even before he achieved fame at home, died of leukemia at San Pedro Peninsula Hospital, said his wife, Linda.

She said that although he had suffered from the disease for about a year, he had worked until recently. A book of his letters titled "Screams from the Balcony" was published a few months ago, and a new book of poetry, "Pulp," is scheduled for publication in three weeks.

"If I die," he told the Los Angeles Times in 1987, "I hope I go with my head on that typewriter. It's my battlefield."

Considered the leader of the tough, masculine "Meat School" poets, Bukowski reveled in subjects thought best left alone by more genteel contemporaries - sex, violence, alcohol abuse. Yet he wrote and spoke in the sweet, syncopated rhythms that unquestionably are labeled poetry.

"I've been run over, beaten up, jailed - I've picked up a lot of baggage along the way, everything from ex-wives to ex-jobs," he said in 1987 after "Barfly" won him interviews in national media. "I've always been worried about my damn soul - maybe I worry too much. But you carry in one hand a bundle of darkness that accumulates each day. And when death finally comes, you say right away, `Hey, buddy, glad to see ya!' "

A surprisingly disciplined and prolific writer in spite of his hard-drinking, womanizing, gambler persona, Bukowski published more than 1,000 poems, 32 books of poetry, five books of short stories, half a dozen novels and the screenplay. More than 2 million copies of his books are in print, most of them translated into languages like French, Greek and Portuguese.

Bukowski's hero frequently was his alter ego Henry Chinaski, a hard-drinking, womanizing, gambling writer who stumbles between bars and odd jobs. Chinaski was played by actor Mickey Rourke in "Barfly," which concentrated on three days in Bukowski's life at age 24.

by CNB