Tag Archives: Matthias kruger

Cool shirt, Buk!

I happened across this meme on my hard drive just the other day. I don’t know who made it (though I will cheerfully give credit here if the individual steps forward). [UPDATE — the creator is none other than Brian Whitmore. 🙂 ]

That is, of course, Charles Bukowski wearing a t-shirt with the face of the late, wonderful Matthias Kruger.

Matthias founded Newington Blue Press in Germany. It was a platform that gave so many independent creators an opportunity to see their work featured in beautifully rendered chapbooks devoted to Bukowski. (I was one of them.)

Matthias is known to have had an excellent sense of humor. I think the meme below would have made him smile.



Some very sad news.

I am so sorry to have to share some terribly sad news here.  I spoke recently with a family member of Matthias Kruger,  the truly wonderful publisher at Newington Blue Press in Germany.  Our friend Matthias has passed away very suddenly due to a heart attack.

If you were lucky enough to know Matthias, then you know how important he was to so many creative people.  He was an easygoing, sublimely good-natured man whose love of literature was cheerfully contagious.  This was best evidenced, of course, by his outstanding work on Newington Blue Press’ BUK100 series — a beautiful series of elegant chapbooks commemorating the legacy of Charles Bukowski.

If you are anything like me, you hope that Mathias is somewhere tonight kicking back and having a beer with ol’ Buk himself — who is doubtlessly pleased by the way Matthias encouraged countless others to enjoy the writer’s work.



BUK100 Issue #4 includes “Confession” and a photo of mine.

I’m honored to share here that Newington Blue Press in Germany will publish my poem “Confession,” along with at least one of my photos, in the upcoming BUK100 Issue #4 — the Forever Young Edition.

Preorder information can be found here.

Thanks once again to Publishing Editor Matthias Kruger for allowing me to showcase my work in this outstanding chapbook series dedicated to Charles Bukowski!



Beat Scene Magazine Praises Buk 100 Volume 2.

There’s a terrific review of Buk 100: Notes for a Dirty Old Birthday in the latest issue of Beat Scene magazine. (Notes for a Dirty Old Birthday is the second volume of Newington Blue Press’ Buk 100 series of limited edition chapbooks. They are dedicated to Charles Bukowski, and all three of the chapbooks include contributions from me.)

Congratulations to Editors Matthias Kruger and Rebecca McLeish for seeing their handiwork so favorably received by this long running British magazine dedicated to beat culture!




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