Bukowski spent much of his life sleeping on the streets, and was a long-term functioning alcoholic. One of his poems describes his enjoyment of having a medical checkup at which he found that his drinking had had no perceptible effect on his health.
The film Barfly, starring Mickey Rourke[?], was based on his life.
See also: Black Mountain Poets[?]
wikipedia.org dumped 2003-03-17 with terodump