POST
OFFICE – CHARLES BUKOWSKI
When I first read Post Office by Charles Bukowski as a
teenager I didn't really rate it. Reading it again years later,
however, I appreciate it much more and am duly impressed. Why might
this be? Age and experience, I presume? As a teenager I would have
had little concept of the world of work apart from the fact that I
didn't wish to get too heavily involved in it. Having now worked at a
variety of jobs of the kind that Bukowski writes about in Post
Office, I can now understand where he's coming from. In addition, now
that I know a bit more about Bukowski and thanks to YouTube have now
heard his beautiful voice, I appreciate him much more as a writer.
Post Office is a book that probably everyone should read,
particularly those stuck in low-paid, menial, exploitative jobs. And
believe me, that's a lot of people. Bukowski nails it again and again
by highlighting all the small but universal things that come with
having a crap job. The low pay (of course), the impossible hours, the
petty rules, the strict productivity, the impossibility of saving
anything from the low wages, the overtime to make ends meet, the
mealy-minded managers, the constant tiredness, the resultant ill
health, the high turnover of staff, the cretinous work colleagues,
the constant fear and threat of dismissal, the repetitiveness, the
stupidity, etc, etc.
That's not to say it's all doom and gloom because when you're working
in a low-paid, menial job there is always a dark humour to it. For
those who have a sense of the ridiculous there is never ending
laughter to be had either at your own expense or the expense of those
in job positions above that of your own.
And so it is with Bukowski's Post Office. There is a sense of humour
that pervades the whole book be it when he's writing about his job or
when he's relaying comic tales from his social life. Alongside this
there is also madness, sadness, celebration and hope. All the stuff
of life, essentially.
Bukowski weathers the storm and at the end makes his move to a better
life by resigning from his job after enduring it for twelve long
years. Not to move into better employment but to move away from
employment altogether for the sake of his health, his sanity, his
soul – and for the hell of it.
'Maybe I'll write a novel,' Bukowski thinks to himself. And so
he did, and he called it Post Office.
There's a quote by Charles Bukowski where he says: 'How in the
hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 8.30am by an alarm clock,
leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair,
and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots
of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the
opportunity to do so?'
Is this not a universal truth? There are jobs that can be enjoyed, of
course, and there is such a thing as the dignity of labour but when
you're talking about low-paid, menial, exploitative jobs this all
goes out the window. The tragedy of it is that a huge swath of people
have no other option but to work in such jobs if they wish to survive
in the world. You work or you starve. You work or you lose your home.
You work or you die. Or so we're led to believe. The even greater
tragedy of it is that still to this day nothing is very different to
how it's always been and in many ways is actually even worse now.
It's just the way it is, you might say? And you wouldn't be wrong.
But does that mean it's just the way it's always going to be? Does
that mean it must only get worse, with all those stuck in the
drudgery of rubbish jobs being ground down ever further year after
year, generation after generation?
There must be some kind of way out of the poverty trap, surely? And
there is. For the individual – on their own – there are indeed
ways to strike out for a better life. In Post Office, Bukowski writes
his way out using the subject of his job at the post office as source
material, along with tales of his life in the gutter as he looks up
at the stars. And that's fine. That's all well and good. But rather
than individuals escaping one at a time, what is really required is
for there to be a mass breakout, for everyone to escape en masse
and for there to be no-one left behind. For until all are free, none
are free.
That is the dream...
John Serpico
