Slouching Toward Nirvana
Charles Bukowski
Come On In!
Charles Bukowski
Come On In!
A posthumous collection published twelve years after Bukowski's death, near the end of the archive series.
- 2006
- Wry
- Melancholy
- Savage
- autobiographical
- voice-driven
- spare
- funny
About Charles Bukowski
The story, briefly
Spoiler-freeCome On In!, published by Ecco in 2006, arrived a dozen years after Charles Bukowski's death and showed the posthumous archive still producing — the fourth of the Ecco-era volumes drawn from the reserve of unpublished poems he left behind. The poems keep the standing subjects of the late work: the city, the writing desk, the racetrack, memory, and death. The annual archive volumes were approaching their end; The People Look Like Flowers at Last followed in 2007 and The Continual Condition closed the sequence in 2009. In 2013 the writer Michael Phillips showed that poems in this series had been altered before printing, and restored editions followed.
The story, in more detail
By 2006 the archive series was nearing its end: two more volumes followed, in 2007 and 2009, and then the annual books stopped. In 2013, manuscript comparisons published by Michael Phillips documented that poems in the posthumous volumes had been altered in editing. Readers who want the late poems as Bukowski typed them should go to the restored editions edited by Abel Debritto; this volume is part of the series as it originally appeared.
Why we recommend it
Near the end of the series
One of the last volumes of the archive series, which ended in 2009 after a dozen years of posthumous books.
The title's invitation
Come On In! is an invitation, plainly meant: the reader is being asked into the late poems.
What this book explores
Timeline
2006
Ecco publishes the collection, twelve years after Bukowski's death.
2009
The Continual Condition closes the archive series three years later.
Book editions
- Hardcover
- Ecco
- 2006
- 9780060577056
Reader reviews
Readers may also like
Bone Palace Ballet
Charles Bukowski
The Last Night of the Earth Poems
The final collection Bukowski assembled himself — the book the posthumous volumes are always compared against.
Read our takeCome On In!: frequently asked questions
What is Come On In!?
A posthumous collection of previously unpublished Charles Bukowski poems, published by Ecco in 2006 from the archive he left at his death in 1994.
How long did the posthumous series run?
From Bone Palace Ballet in 1997 to The Continual Condition in 2009 — a dozen years of volumes from the reserve, first at Black Sparrow, then at Ecco. Restored editions followed in the 2010s.
Are these poems as Bukowski wrote them?
The posthumous volumes carry a documented editing question: 2013 manuscript comparisons showed substantial alterations, and Abel Debritto's restored editions — backed by Bukowski's widow Linda Lee Bukowski — print the manuscripts unrevised.
Where does the title come from?
It is Bukowski's own phrase, an invitation to the reader. No source poem outside the book is being quoted.
Is it still in print?
Yes — Ecco keeps it in its catalogue.
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
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
Ernest Hemingway
Author of The Sun Also Rises and A Moveable Feast; his pared-down style, developed in 1920s Paris, became the most imitated in American prose.
View author
References
References
The sources below include the primary text, editions, scholarship, archival materials, and other records that informed this page. They document Come On In!, its publication, and its place in literary history.
1Come On In!
PoetryCharles Bukowski, 2006Used forThe primary text represented by this page, used for descriptions of the work’s contents and for any quoted passages shown here.
2Charles Bukowski timeline (bukowski.net)
WebsiteUsed forPublication year and the volume's place in the closing stretch of the series.
3Bukowski's poems were mangled by editors after his death. Now you can read his originals
PeriodicalPBS NewsHourUsed forThe documented editing of the posthumous poems and the restored editions.
4Charles Bukowski's Posthumous Poetry: As the Spirit Wanes, Shit Happens
PeriodicalLos Angeles Review of BooksUsed forCritical account of the posthumous program.
5Come On In! — edition record
Official recordOpen Library, Internet ArchiveUsed forOfficial record used to verify names, dates, institutional details, or other factual information on this page.
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