Screams from the Balcony
The first volume of letters, covering the post-office decade before this one.
Read our take
Living on Luck
The second volume of letters: the years Bukowski left the post office, published his first novel, and became a writer people had heard of.
- 1995
About Charles Bukowski
About the volume
Living on Luck, published by Black Sparrow Press in 1995 and edited by Seamus Cooney, is the second of three volumes of Charles Bukowski's selected letters. It follows Screams from the Balcony into the 1970s — the decade when he left the post office on John Martin's monthly stipend, published Post Office in 1971, and turned from a poet known to little-magazine readers into a writer with an audience in Europe and America. The letters record that change from inside: correspondence with editors and publishers, arguments about money and print runs, and the ordinary business of a writing life conducted mostly by mail. The first edition was issued with 200 copies signed on a tipped-in sheet.
The volume, in more detail
The three volumes of letters together cover 1960 to 1994. This middle one covers the years his working life changed: he stopped sorting mail and started writing full time. In the first volume Bukowski is sorting mail and writing at night; by the end of this one he is a full-time writer whose books sell in translation. The letters show the change arriving in small steps — a contract, a translation, a reading — rather than in one dramatic break.
Themes and analysis
Waiting in the checkout line
The imagined queue frames a tension made explicit in the collection's opening letter. Writing to Corrington on January 17, 1961, Bukowski asks whether he would still write without readers. His answer changes after the hospital episode he recounts, but writing does not remove the unwanted tasks of living: it becomes something he can do alongside them. The stick-and-sand image strips authorship of publication, money and acclaim. This is less a career milestone than a test of motive, and the letter's warning that a writer can cease being one overnight resists a comfortable story of permanent arrival.
Blackbirds above the wheat
Blackbirds and wheat belong to an argument about poetic energy, not a remembered countryside excursion. In the letter passage quoted by George Douglas Anderson, Bukowski counters the pursuit of a perfectly adjusted phrase with a rush of color, sound and repeated sunlight. The movement of the sentence demonstrates the force he wants poetry to have. His comparisons with lovemaking and drinking insist on bodily involvement rather than detached rule-making. The peaceful field in the illustration captures only one part of that restless sequence: the letter turns its images into a challenge to literary respectability.
Why we recommend it
The turn, documented
The decade Bukowski stopped sorting mail and started writing full time, recorded as it happened.
The business of writing
Contracts, print runs, translations and arguments about money — the working life the poems leave out.
Success described while it happens
The letters preserve practical uncertainties during the career change rather than explaining the decade only with hindsight.
What this book explores
Timeline
1970
Bukowski leaves the post office on John Martin's monthly stipend — the change this volume documents.
1993
Screams from the Balcony begins Seamus Cooney’s selected-letter sequence; Living on Luck becomes its second volume.
1995
Black Sparrow Press publishes the volume, edited by Seamus Cooney.
Book editions
- Paperback
- Black Sparrow Press
- 1995
- 9780876859827
Reader reviews
Readers may also like
Living on Luck: frequently asked questions
What is Living on Luck?
The second of three volumes of Charles Bukowski's selected letters, published by Black Sparrow Press in 1995 and edited by Seamus Cooney. It follows the 1960s volume into the 1970s.
What years does it cover?
The turn of the 1970s onward: leaving the post office in 1970, publishing Post Office in 1971, and the growth of his readership through the decade.
How does it differ from the first volume?
Screams from the Balcony is a man with a day job writing to little-magazine editors. This volume is a full-time writer dealing with publishers, contracts and translations.
How many volumes of selected letters are there?
Three from Black Sparrow, all edited by Seamus Cooney: Screams from the Balcony (1993), Living on Luck (1995), and Reach for the Sun (1999).
Is there a signed edition?
Yes — the first edition included 200 copies signed by Bukowski on a tipped-in sheet.
How does it fit with the other letters volumes?
It is the second of three, all edited by Seamus Cooney on the same principle — chronological order, roughly half of each letter, repetition cut.
If you like Charles Bukowski
Explore authors with a similar voice, perspective, and influence.
Louis-Ferdinand Céline
The doctor of the Paris slums who wrote the century's blackest, funniest novel — and changed the sound of French prose.
View author
Henry Miller
The Brooklyn dropout who arrived in Paris broke at thirty-eight and wrote the exuberant, banned books that ended American censorship.
View author
Simone de Beauvoir
French writer and philosopher whose novels, memoirs, and social analysis examined freedom, gender, responsibility, aging, and the material conditions that shape a life.
View author
References
References
The sources below include the primary text, editions, scholarship, archival materials, and other records that informed this page. They document Living on Luck, its publication, and its place in literary history.
1Living on Luck
LettersCharles Bukowski, 1995Used 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 1970s — leaving the post office, Post Office, and the European readership — in the career narrative.
3Charles Bukowski timeline (bukowski.net)
WebsiteUsed forPublication year, editor, and the chronology the letters cover.
4Charles Bukowski: books and chapbooks (Verdant Press checklist)
WebsiteUsed forEdition details, including the signed issue.
5Living on Luck: Selected Letters, Volume 2 — edition record
Official recordOpen Library, Internet ArchiveUsed forOfficial record used to verify names, dates, institutional details, or other factual information on this page.
6Living on Luck: Chapter One (publisher-authorized excerpt)
WebsiteHarperCollins / eCampusUsed forPublisher-authorized opening excerpt displayed by eCampus; the new reading concerns the letter to Corrington dated January 17, 1961, not the complete volume.
7Book Review: Charles Bukowski Living on Luck (quoted letter passages)
WebsiteBold Monkey Review, 2013Used forPrimary passage from the letter to the editor of Trace quoted in Anderson's review; used for the blackbird and wheat imagery, not as a complete-letter transcription.
i
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.
Explore more resources