A prolific and seminal figure in underground literature, Charles Bukowski (1920-1994) is best known for poetry and fiction in which he caustically indicts bourgeois society while celebrating the desperate lives of alcoholics, prostitutes, decadent writers, and other disreputable characters in and around Los Angeles.

Born in 1920 in Andernach, Germany, Bukowski emigrated to Los Angeles in 1922 with his father, an American soldier, and his German mother. As an adolescent he was distanced from his peers by a disfiguring case of acne and he resisted the attempts of his abusive and uncompromising father to instill in him the American ideals of hard work and patriotism. Following high school, Bukowski attended Los Angeles City College from 1939 to 1941 but left without obtaining a degree. He began writing hundreds of unsuccessful short stories while drifting from city to city in a succession of low-paying jobs--including work as a mailman, post office clerk, Red...