Post Office
Charles Bukowski
Post Office
The next chapter in the life: the wanderer fixed in place by one enormous employer.
Read our takeFactotum
Charles Bukowski
Factotum
Henry Chinaski across wartime America, one abandoned job at a time — the American work ethic, refused politely and then not politely.
- 1975
- Wry
- Spare
- Melancholy
- autobiographical
- voice-driven
- episodic
- funny
About Charles Bukowski
The story, briefly
Spoiler-freeFactotum, Charles Bukowski's second novel, published by Black Sparrow Press in 1975, follows his fictional alter ego Henry Chinaski through the wandering years of the early 1940s: city to city, rooming house to rooming house, job to job. A factotum is a general hand who does whatever needs doing, and Chinaski does it all badly — warehouses, stockrooms, shipping departments — working because rent is due, quitting because he can, and getting fired for the rest. Underneath the comedy of terrible jobs runs the book's real subject: a man who needs money badly enough to work but never badly enough to believe in the work, carrying a rejected short story from town to town like proof of another life.
The story, in more detail
Rejected by the wartime draft and by every editor he submits to, the young Chinaski drifts through New Orleans, St. Louis, Philadelphia, New York and Los Angeles, taking whatever work exists and losing it: a pickle factory, a bicycle warehouse, an auto-parts stockroom, a dozen more. The jobs are interchangeable and the novel knows it — the repetition is the point, not a flaw in the plot.
Between jobs there is drinking, the racetrack, and Jan, the lover whose fights and reconciliations give the middle of the book its pulse. Through all of it Chinaski keeps writing stories and mailing them to magazines, collecting rejections — the one thread in the novel that points anywhere but down. Bukowski drew the material from his own wandering years in the 1940s, transformed with three decades of hindsight.
Why we recommend it
The best of the early Chinaski novels
Tighter than Women, funnier than its reputation, and the purest statement of Bukowski's argument with the American work ethic.
Work, demythologized
Jobs do not build character here and employment confers no dignity — the novel says so out loud, decades before that became a common thing to say.
What this book explores
Timeline
1941–1946
Bukowski's real wandering years: cities, short-lived jobs, and the rejections that later become the novel's material.
1944
Story magazine publishes his first professional piece, 'Aftermath of a Lengthy Rejection Slip' — the real event behind the novel's mailed-out manuscripts.
1975
Black Sparrow Press publishes Factotum.
Book editions
Paperback
- Paperback
- Black Sparrow Press
- 1975
- Paperback
- Ecco
- 2002
- 9780061131271
Reader reviews
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Read our takeFactotum: frequently asked questions
What is Factotum about?
Charles Bukowski's second novel follows Henry Chinaski, his fictional alter ego, through the early 1940s as he drifts between American cities and dozens of low-paid jobs — working because rent is due, quitting or getting fired, drinking, and mailing out short stories that keep coming back rejected.
What does the title Factotum mean?
A factotum is a general hand employed to do all kinds of work. The title is the novel's thesis: Chinaski does every job and belongs to none of them.
Should I read Post Office or Factotum first?
Post Office is the usual entry point — it was written first and is the faster book. Factotum covers the earlier years of Chinaski's life, so readers who want life-chronology can read it before Post Office without harm.
Is Factotum autobiographical?
It draws on Bukowski's real wandering years in the 1940s — the cities, the jobs, the rejections — but Chinaski is a fictional exaggeration of his author, and the novel rearranges the facts freely.
When was Factotum published?
Black Sparrow Press published it in 1975, when Bukowski was fifty-five.
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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 Factotum, its publication, and its place in literary history.
1Factotum
NovelCharles Bukowski, 1975Used forThe primary text represented by this page, used for descriptions of the work’s contents and for any quoted passages shown here.
2Charles Bukowski (Poetry Foundation)
WebsiteUsed forBiographical and bibliographic backbone: the career arc, the Black Sparrow relationship, and the book's place in it.
3Charles Bukowski timeline (bukowski.net)
WebsiteUsed forPublication dates, publishers, and chronology checked against the bukowski.net timeline.
4Charles Bukowski: books and chapbooks (Verdant Press checklist)
WebsiteUsed forBibliographic details cross-checked against the Verdant Press checklist.
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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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