Photo by Sophie Bassouls/Corbis Sygma
The City Council of Los Angeles made it official Tuesday. It voted to preserve the one-time residence of poet and author Charles Bukowski, puncher of walls and thrower of radios; a non-native Los Angeleno who came here not to look pretty, but to write vile truths. In doing so, he inspired generations with his voice, if not his breath. So raise a glass, or two, or six, and quit looking at me like that you ugly mother.
Bukowski's was not exactly an exemplary life. As he wrote in the script of BARFLY:
Anybody can be a non-drunk. It takes a special talent to be a drunk. It takes endurance. Endurance is more important than truth.
Endurance.
Bukowski had it to spare, as so few seem to have (yes, Hunter S. Thompson had it too) and now, by association, so does Bukowski's former bungalow on De Longpre Avenue in Hollywood. The walls that survived all that rage have now dodged a wrecking ball, too. The bungalow is officially protected as a historic LA landmark.