The subtle art of not giving a fuck
Description
Vocal Characteristics
Language
EnglishVoice Age
Young Adult (18-35)Transcript
Note: Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and may contain errors.
Don't try. Charles Bakowski was an alcoholic, a womanizer, a chronic gambler, a load, a cheap skate, a dead pit. And on his worst days, a poet, he's probably the last person on earth you would ever look to for life advice or expect to see in any sort of self-help book, which is why he's the perfect place to start. Bukowski wanted to be a writer, but for decades, his work was rejected by almost every magazine, newspaper, journal agent and publisher. He submitted to his work was horrible. They said cute, disgusting, depraved. And as the stocks of rejection sleep piled up the weight of his failures, push him deep into an alcoholic fuel, depression that would follow him for most of his life. Butowsky had a day job as a leather filer at a post office. He got paid **** money and spent most of it in booze. He gambled away to rest at the racetrack at night. He would drink alone and sometimes hammer out poetry on his beat up old typewriter. Often he'd wake up on the floor having passed out the night before 30 years went by like this, most of it, a meaningless beer of alcohol, drugs, gambling, and prostitutes. Then Juan Bukowski was 50 after a lifetime of failure and self loathing an editor at a small independent publishing house took a strange interest in him. The editor couldn't offer Bukowski much money or much promise of sales, but he had a weird affection for the drunk loser. So he decided to take a chance on him. It was the first real shot Bakowski had ever gotten and he realized probably the only one he would ever get. Bukowski wrote back to the editor. I have one of two choices. Stay in the post office and go crazy or stay out here and play a drier and starve. I have decided to starve upon signing the contract. Bakowski wrote his first novel in three weeks. It was called Simply Post Office in a dedication he wrote dedicated to nobody. Makowski would make it as a novelist and poet. He would go on and publish six novels and hundreds of poems selling over 2 million copies of his book. His popularity defied everyone's expectation, particularly his own stories like Bukowski's are the bread and butter of our culture. Narrative Bakowski life embodies the American dream. A man fights for what he wants. Never gives up and eventually achieves his wildest dreams. It's practically a movie waiting to happen. We all look at stories like Bukowski and say, see he never gave up, he never stopped trying, he always believed in himself. He persisted against all odds and made something of himself. It is then strange that on Bukowski's tombstone, the epitaph reads don't try. See, despite the book sales and the fame Bukowski was a loser, he knew it and his success seemed not from some determination to be a winner, but from the fact that he knew he was a loser, accepted it and then wrote honestly about it had never tried to be anything other than what he was. The genius in Posy's work was not in overcoming unbelievable odds or developing himself into a shining literary light. It was the opposite. It was a simple ability to be completely unflinchingly honest with himself, especially the worst parts of himself and to share his feelings without hesitation or doubt. This is the real story of Posy's success. His comfort with himself as a failure. Bukowski didn't give an f about success. Even after his fame, he still showed up to poetry, reading, hammered and verbally abused people in his audience. He still exposed himself in public and tried to sleep with every woman. He could find fame and success didn't make him a better person. Moore was said by becoming a better person that he became famous and successful.