However, in his another poem, Roll the Dice, he presents something entirely different outlook on the subject of trying. And this is a poem I really admire.

  ROLL THE DICE

  -------------

  If you’re going to try, go all the way.

  Otherwise, don’t even start.

  If you’re going to try, go all the way.

  This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives, jobs and maybe even your mind.

  It could mean not eating for three or four days.

  It could mean freezing on a park bench.

  It could mean jail.

  It could mean derision, mockery, isolation.

  Isolation is the gift.

  All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it.

  And, you’ll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds.

  And it will be better than anything else you can imagine.

  If you’re going to try, go all the way.

  There is no other feeling like that.

  You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire.

  DO IT. DO IT. DO IT. All the way

  You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It’s the only good fight there is.

Bukowskis poem seem to represent the romantic idea that art is divinely inspired and the artist is just a vessel. Maybe it really felt like that for Bokowski, while for others writing is just hard work.

It is funny that Adams who have such a playful style of prose found writing torture, while the much more self-important and edgy Bukowski find it easy. (Assuming the poem represent his own experience.)

Also, handy tip for those who want to write: get a 3x5” or smaller spiral notebook and a pen with a clip that can fit in the spiral. Put it in your pocket and take it everywhere. See something funny or unique standing in line? Scribble it down.

Eventually you’ll get better and better at picking your words on the spot, of translating from your head to the page and then to a reader. It’s harmless practice and sometimes you can surprise yourself. Writers write.

Then people accuse us of being lazy because when we’re working the hardest the most anybody sees is somebody glaring at a screen or piece of paper in a typewriter.

  Woke up this morning, and it seemed to me
  That every night turns out to be
  A little bit more like Bukowski
  And yeah, I know he's a pretty good read
  But God, who'd wanna be
  God, who'd wanna be such an asshole
  God, who'd wanna be
  God, who'd wanna be such an asshole
    - Modest Mouse

https://mjpbooks.com/blog/the-senseless-tragic-rape-of-charl...

from the article: In the posthumous collections, Black Sparrow publisher John Martin has made changes to the majority of Bukowski’s poems. Damaging changes that run counter to just about everything Bukowski represented. Wholesale removal of references to drinking, drugs, sex and madness. Changes that completely alter the meaning of the manuscripts. Changes that don’t even begin to make sense. It feels like nothing short of gleeful, unrepentant vandalism and destruction.

> staring at your computer screen

> or hunched over your

> typewriter

> searching for words,

> don't do it.

I don't claim to BE a writer, but I think I had moments of good writing in my life, and I like writing a lot (I wrote two - largely unsuccessful, of course - novels, two technical books, and tons of other stuff), and I completely disagree with this. And for most of the rest of the poem.

  If you want to be a writer write. If you aren't writing irrespective of any external concern, you aren't a writer

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32771235

  don't be like so many writers,
  don't be like so many thousands of
  people who call themselves writers,
  don't be dull and boring and
  pretentious, don't be consumed with self-
  love.
  the libraries of the world have
  yawned themselves to
  sleep
  over your kind.
  don't add to that.
  don't do it.

I've heard of many writers - fiction, non-fiction, poets, all types - who do rewrite things again and again. I don't see why that wouldn't make them a writer.

If anything, it seems the desire to improve a piece is a desirable trait.

I /strongly/ disagree with this. If you cannot revise, and have no stomach for it, then don't do it.

First drafts are garbage; always.

I certainly believe that is true.

When I do my best work (programming, not poetry) I feel like I was inspired. I always get inspired in the same way, by doing the hard work for as long as it takes, and that usually feels like torture.

Perhaps Adams and Bukowski use a simmilar method to each other, but is just presented differently.

> Charles Bukowski:

> if you have to sit for hours staring at your computer screen or hunched over your typewriter searching for words, don't do it.

> if it's hard work just thinking about doing it

I read this as "if you don't want to do it, then don't", not as "If it is hard work then don't do it". Thinking about doing it, and doing it are different things.

I really don't believe that any world class writer (or world class anything) got inspired before doing the hard work first. That is a romantic idea, not the inspiration itself.

I mean that in the same sense a movie like Airplane! is just about stringing jokes together, and has no deeper plot or "cinematic" qualities (compared to a comedy like Shaun of the Dead or Young Frankenstein).

I'm reminded of the outcome of the two groups of potters in a pottery class, one group challenged to make a perfect piece and the other to make as many pieces as possible:

https://excellentjourney.net/2015/03/04/art-fear-the-ceramic...

As an author of many years and thousands of pages, I can relate to this. There is an oft misattributed quote on the matter, "I hate to write, but I love having written." In my case "hate" is too strong a verb, I merely find it exhausting. And yet somehow I wish I had more time to do it.