Charles Bukowski’s "Ham on Rye" Summary

The novel was published in 1982. The text is dedicated to the childhood and youth of Henry Chinaski during the Great Depression in Los Angeles.

The work is part of the Chinaski novel series. It occupies the fourth place in the series, continuing the storyline after the novels "Post Office" (1971), "Factotum" (1975), and "Women" (1978). The series concluded with "Hollywood" in 1989.

Early childhood and family order

Henry’s first memories date back to 1922 in Germany. He was sitting under the dining room tablecloth. The family soon moved to California. His parents spoke German and were wary of strangers. His grandmother, Emily, kept canaries in Pasadena and threatened to outlive the rest of the family at every Sunday dinner. His grandfather, Leonard, lived apart from his wife, abused alcohol, and gave his grandson a tin box with an iron cross and a gold pocket watch.

His father delivered milk in the mornings and categorically forbade his son from interacting with the neighbors’ children. Sunday trips to the orange groves in their old car turned into scandals. His father began stealing fruit, and a tall farmer chased the entire family out at gunpoint. A visit to a mountain sanatorium to see Uncle Ben, dying of tuberculosis, and a trip to Uncle John’s impoverished family only fueled his father’s hatred for everyone around him.

Elementary school and school clashes

Attending kindergarten left Henry with bouts of nausea and a fear of the bathrooms. Delsey Elementary School was a brutal school. The older students would engage in daily wrestling matches in the backyard. The boy remained aloof from his peers.

His only friend was the cross-eyed, breeches-wearing David. Bullies would stalk David on the street and beat him up for his ridiculous attire, and at home, his mother would beat him for his torn clothes and force him to play the violin. A school baseball pitch earned Henry a long, accurate hit. The team captain still refused to accept the newcomer. Later, in the principal’s office, Mr. Knox squeezed the boy’s fingers painfully in his own palm, forcing him to acknowledge his strength.

Every Saturday, his father forced his son to mow the lawn. He had to trim the edges with a lawn knife and snip off individual stems with scissors. Whenever he found even the smallest blade of grass, his father would take him to the bathroom and slash his buttocks with a razor blade. His mother would dispassionately repeat the paternal formula of righteousness.

Street Experience and Justin’s High School

Neighborhood girl Lila Jane showed Henry her panties in the thick grass of a vacant lot. Her friendship with the one-armed boy Red ended in a fight with a street gang, where his prosthetic arm served as a club. Soon, Red’s family moved out of the neighborhood without a trace.

In fifth grade, Mrs. Freetag assigned an essay about President Hoover’s state visit to Los Angeles. Henry spent Saturday at home mowing the lawn, invented colorful details about the president’s speech, and turned in the essay. The teacher read the text to the class as a model of creative writing.

The seventh-grade students at Justin’s School were rude and cynical. The teenagers observed the outfits of their English teacher, Miss Greedies, and listened to raunchy jokes during shop class in Pop Funsworth’s workshop. Student Richard White violated school etiquette right during lectures. Handsome classmate Harry Walden committed suicide. His father lost his job at the dairy plant. He continued to drive every morning to give the appearance of being busy. During yet another beating in the bathroom, his son met the blows with silence. His father, distraught, put away his belt forever.

Illness and a bandaged face

By the age of fourteen, the teenager’s body was ravaged by severe inflammation of the sebaceous glands. Giant boils completely covered his face, neck, and back.

His father transferred the young man to Chelsea High School, hoping to immerse him in the affluent community. Ashamed to expose his sores in physical education, Henry enlisted in the Reserve Officers’ Corps. The rough wool of his military uniform chafed his back and shoulders until they bled. School officials suspended him from classes because of his unsettling appearance.

The treatment took place at the county charity hospital. Doctors were examining an unusual case. Every week, the doctor drilled out the pustules with a hot electric needle. Nurse Janice Ackerman carefully squeezed out blood, administered ultraviolet radiation, and applied thick gauze bandages. His bandaged head hid his face from passersby on the tram. In bed, the teenager filled a yellow notebook with stories about the fearless German pilot Baron von Himmlin.

Library Discoveries and Senior Classes

The father got a job as a museum security guard. The family was deprived of free medical care, and a private doctor prescribed carrot juice.

A chance visit to the La Signage Public Library opened the young man’s eyes to the world of literature. He began reading books by Upton Sinclair, D.H. Lawrence, Sherwood Anderson, Ernest Hemingway, Ivan Turgenev, and Maxim Gorky. He continued reading at night, under the covers by the light of a desk lamp, despite his father’s cries.

Returning to Chelsea High School exacerbated the distance between the wealthy students in convertibles and the penniless vagabond. Henry ate bologna sandwiches under the bleachers, socializing with the wily Jimmy Hatcher and the slobbering straight-A student Abe Martenson. In his friends’ backyard, he sparred with boxer Harry Gibson. During a baseball game, Henry collided with Abe and broke his classmate’s arm. At Hatcher’s, the teenager drank beer for the first time in the presence of his mother, Claire. The graduation ceremony exposed the deep gulf between the wealthy graduates and the impoverished teenagers forced to watch the celebration from outside through the wire mesh of the stuffy gymnasium. At the graduation ceremony, the principal shook hands with the students, and Henry threw the medal he had won at the parade down a manhole.

First Service and City College

His job as a loader in the Mir’s-Starbucks department store warehouse lasted only three days. Manager Eddie Feris demanded minute-by-minute timekeeping. A confrontation with former high school football player Jimmy Newhal on the roof of the parking lot escalated into a fight. The young man knocked the arrogant athlete down and lost his job.

In the fall, classes began in the journalism department at City College. Henry skipped lectures, drank away the money his parents gave him for textbooks, and was rude to his English teacher, Hamilton. On campus, he became acquainted with Robert Becker, who dreamed of a literary career.

A protest against the teachers escalated into outrageous speeches in class. At the invitation of friends, the young man attended a basement meeting of right-wing radicals, where the chairman called for fighting communists. At the home of the thug Igor Smirnov, a drinking bout culminated in him firing a revolver into the floor and swimming in a lake at night.

A break with home and war alarm

His father found his son’s short stories hidden in a linen drawer. The enraged parent threw the clothes, papers, and typewriter onto the front lawn. His mother ambushed him in the bushes, gave him ten dollars, and asked him not to return. Henry gathered up the scattered manuscript pages and left the house.

His new refuge was a room on Temple Street in the Filipino neighborhood. Nights were spent drinking cheap wine and playing cards with factory workers. After a riotous drinking session and a brawl, the young man moved to a shack on Bunker Hill for two and a half dollars a week.

On December 7, 1941, the bar’s radio interrupted the music with an announcement of the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor. Becker, in his Marine uniform, hurried to the assembly point. Alone on Main Street, Henry entered an empty arcade. He paid with a coin for a game of tabletop boxing against a strange Mexican boy, lost the match, and silently left the establishment.