Post Office by Charles Bukowski
Recommended by Rufus Law
If you were to merely scratch the surface of this novel it would be hard to criticise you for thinking it was a shallow story of an even shallower man.
It’s a bitterly amusing tale of a particularly hedonistic character as he goes through the ups and downs of life, wealth and poverty and countless encounters with the fairer sex, meanwhile managing to maintain a varying state of intoxication. But underneath the meaningless sex and constant boozing is a depressing sadness and loneliness as the reader watches the antihero, Henry Chinaski, pass years of his life without making any meaningful relationships, while falling deeper and deeper into a destructive partnership with alcohol.
Despite the darker themes, the novel is no doubt hilarious, even if sometimes you’ll feel guilty for laughing. It’s probably the fact that the novel is mostly autobiographical that brings a certain looseness to the prose, which allows the humour to come across so naturally. The simplicity of the anecdotal style keeps the prose elegant without becoming too purple, and the casual, conversational tone makes for easy reading.
Although there isn’t much obvious desire for empathy in the book, Chinaski’s wit and cynicism, and general maverick behaviour, gives him a twisted charm that allows the reader to chuckle at his blunders, but also be genuinely pleased for him in his successes.
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