freshman0521

I thought this thin volume was a manila file folder when I first spotted it on the shelf in the library. It's really an illustrated short story by king curmudgeons of sixties counter culture Charles Bukowski and R. Crumb. Don't let the tags fool you, this is not a comic. It looks a lot like a children's book with its large type and captioned illustrations. Don't let that fool you either, because Bukowski and Crumb are as adult as expected. The story is classically Bukowski about a man visiting his extremely insane wife in the mental hospital. She's correct about her accusations of his infidelity, but it's not her accusations that make her crazy, it's the way she delivers them. There's nothing disappointing about Bukowski's writing here, it is as poignant, sharp and strangely beautiful as usual. I've seen Crumb's work when he's lazy or rushed and it's not pretty. This is not that bad but it's certainly not his best effort. Technically the drawings are fine, but they lack the Crumb spirit of his best work. I don't know how this collaboration came to be but I imagine that Bukowski and Crumb are probably too alike to get along. I could see them disagreeing on many other things as well. So Give Me Your Love seems to have been a project that was more of job for these two men than a real collaboration. While it's a damn good story, Bukowski could have easily pulled it from a short story archive and Crumb probably drew everything in one day. It's not that I don't think it's worth reading. I just don't think it's worth much effort to read it.

2022-11-14 14:06