Confessions of a Man Insane Enough to Live with Beasts
The first prose pamphlet, published the year before.
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All the Assholes in the World and Mine
The second prose pamphlet: an autobiographical account of a hemorrhoid operation, published a year after the first.
- 1966
About Charles Bukowski
The story, briefly
Spoiler-freeAll the Assholes in the World and Mine is a Charles Bukowski prose pamphlet published in 1966, a year after his first, Confessions of a Man Insane Enough to Live with Beasts. Its subject is exactly what the title says: an operation on his hemorrhoids and the hospital around it, told as autobiography without softening. The piece became one of his better-known early prose works, largely because South of No North collected it in 1973 alongside the other pamphlet, which is how both survived past their tiny original printings. It belongs to the same run of small-press prose that carried Bukowski before Black Sparrow began publishing his fiction.
The story, in more detail
The two 1960s prose pamphlets are the beginning of Bukowski's fiction as a body of work, and they set the terms he kept for thirty years: the writer's own body and circumstances as material, no distance, no apology, and a title that dares the reader. Read now, the piece is also a document of what medical care looked like for a man with no money in mid-1960s Los Angeles.
Themes and analysis
Coffee in the ward
In the later collected story, the white-haired patient’s coffee accompanies a conversation the narrator initially feels obliged to have. Their exchange of drinking stories briefly gives the patients something to offer beyond complaints: each can entertain the other. That connection remains precarious. A visitor’s loud discussion of a film project soon makes company intolerable, and the narrator asks the men to move away from his bed. The ward tests the difference between reciprocal attention and an audience imposed on someone in pain; companionship is welcome only while it leaves room for refusal.
A spider in the sunlight
Returning home does not deliver the silence or hot bath the narrator imagines: repairs and an argument next door persist. Yet familiar disorder changes how he experiences his surroundings. The spider, discarded newspaper and light through the blinds become things he can notice without having to answer anyone. His renewed awareness of his limbs places this modest attention beside the hospital’s earlier bodily humiliation. The ending offers neither an immaculate refuge nor a declaration that suffering is finished. It allows him to belong to an imperfect room and, finally, to sleep.
Why we recommend it
The body as material, from the start
The terms Bukowski kept for thirty years are already set: his own circumstances, no distance, no apology.
One of the better-known early pieces
Collected in South of No North, it has stayed in circulation while most 1960s pamphlets vanished.
A hospital seen without ceremony
The medical setting gives Bukowski’s plain, bodily prose a situation different from the barrooms with which he is usually associated.
What this book explores
Timeline
1966
Published as a small-press pamphlet, a year after Bukowski's first prose book.
1973
South of No North collects the text, keeping it readable.
2009
Ecco releases South of No North digitally, carrying the story into a new reading format.
Book editions
Paperback
- Paperback
- Open Skull Press
- 1966
Reader reviews
Readers may also like
South of No North
The 1973 collection that absorbed both pamphlets and keeps them readable.
Read our take
Notes of a Dirty Old Man
The newspaper column that took this same autobiographical prose weekly a year later.
Read our takeAll the Assholes in the World and Mine: frequently asked questions
What is All the Assholes in the World and Mine about?
An operation on Charles Bukowski's hemorrhoids and the hospital around it, told as autobiography. The title is literal.
When was it published?
In 1966, as a small-press pamphlet — a year after Confessions of a Man Insane Enough to Live with Beasts, his first prose book.
Can I read it today?
Yes. South of No North (1973) collected it, and that book has stayed in print. The original pamphlet is a rare-book item.
Why is a piece about surgery well known?
Because of how it is written: no distance and no apology, with the writer's own body as the material. That approach became the basis of everything he published afterward.
Is Henry Chinaski in it?
The piece is autobiographical rather than told through the Chinaski persona, which had been introduced in the 1965 pamphlet.
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References
References
The sources below include the primary text, editions, scholarship, archival materials, and other records that informed this page. They document All the Assholes in the World and Mine, its publication, and its place in literary history.
1All the Assholes in the World and Mine
NovelCharles Bukowski, 1966Used forThe primary text represented by this page, used for descriptions of the work’s contents and for any quoted passages shown here.
2Charles Bukowski
BiographyReaktion Books, 2012Used forThe mid-1960s small-press prose in the career narrative.
3Charles Bukowski Papers (Huntington Library catalogue)
ArchiveUsed forThe Bukowski papers, which hold manuscripts and correspondence from the pamphlet years.
4Charles Bukowski timeline (bukowski.net)
WebsiteUsed forThe piece's contents and its absorption into South of No North.
5Charles Bukowski: books and chapbooks (Verdant Press checklist)
WebsiteUsed forBibliographic details of the pamphlet checked against the checklist.
6Kobo — South of No North digital edition
WebsiteUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the All the Assholes in the World and Mine page.
7All the Assholes in the World and Mine — Bogdan Rusev’s Bulgarian translation
WebsiteChitanka, reproducing the Fama 2008 edition of South of No North, 2008Used forAnalysis of the later collected story through Bogdan Rusev’s 2008 Bulgarian translation of South of No North, reproduced by Chitanka; sections 10 and 13. Not a collation with the 1966 English pamphlet, and not documentary medical evidence.
8All the Assholes in the World and Mine — publication history
WebsiteBukowski DatabaseUsed forBibliographic connection between the 1966 pamphlet and the story collected in South of No North (1973), p. 152.
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Why these sources are here
The primary text is the baseline reference for every book page. Additional references document publication history, interpretation, and historical context where that evidence is available.
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