The Boy Who Would Be Buchwald : LEAVING HOME: A Memoir, <i> By Art Buchwald (G.P. Putnam’s Sons: $22.95; 256 pp.)</i>

Art Buchwald has always been a straight shooter. If by chance, some of his missiles have made clowns, politicians and various instant and age-old celebrities dance for the general public’s amusement, then so be it.

“Leaving Home” chronicles the first 23 years of Buchwald’s life, through a hardscrabble childhood, much of it spent in foster homes and the Hebrew Orphan Asylum, a stint in the marine corps, and a few years at UCLA, before migrating to Paris to seek his fortune.

Buchwald wrote columns for the European edition of the New York Herald-Tribune. Returning to America he set up offices in Washington, D.C. His syndicated column appears in more than 550 newspapers worldwide. He has written 29 books, won a Pulitzer Prize and been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. His acerbic wit has charmed an international audience for generations. His acerbic wit (I have always meant to look up acerbic , but it seems a delightful companion to wit , and no editor has ever complained to me, so if it ain’t broke don’t fix it) has charmed an international audience for generations.

Candid is the word that best describes Buchwald’s writing. I have no doubt that everything he says is true, or as true as time and memory allow it to be. I’ve considered writing my own memoirs. When I do, I think I’ll go for self-serving, rather than candid. I’m not about to take off the shirt, open the chest and bare the heart as Buchwald does so successfully.

Book reviewing being as subjective as it is, if I wanted to be surly it would be easy to say that “Leaving Home” is another in a long line of autobiographies by mid-list celebrities. There are no breathtaking confessions, no sexual deviance. (I would use the word peccadilloes , except I have never known how to spell it, and it reminds me of something I might see under glass and buy by the dozen in a New York deli.)

There are few skeletons in Buchwald’s closet. As a writer of memoir he will never give Madonna any competition. But for people who have laughed at and with Art Buchwald for over 40 years, this candid look at the man behind the columnist can’t help but please.

Though his sins are few, he is not hesitant to enumerate them in a way that reveals what a sensitive and gentle man he really is. Living in a dysfunctional foster family, the emotionally repressed Buchwald showed assertiveness where he could. In this case, while walking the foster family’s poodle: “As we strolled along, I would scare it by snapping the leash hard with a crack in front of him. I never hit him, but my voice was very cruel, and he shook in fear of me. . . . I have been so ashamed of this, I even debated whether to include it in this book or not.”

Buchwald candidly and humorously describes being caught shoplifting in Woolworth’s at age 11. “Finally it was decided to let me go--on condition that I never enter the store again. Over 60 years have gone by and to this day I have never gone into a Woolworth’s store. It wasn’t a bad lesson. They did scare hell out of me. . . I might have wound up in the underworld or at least in the public relations business.”

Anger, I have always maintained, generates humor. Those who are oppressed survive by making fun of their oppressors. Buchwald confirms my belief. “My anger was buried deep behind the humor. I have always had trouble with anger. I have swallowed it . . . People ask what I am really trying to do with humor. The answer is, ‘I’m getting even.’ . . . For me being funny is the best revenge.” Amen!

Like many humorists and comedians (including myself) Buchwald has suffered from bouts of depression. I’ll bet there is a book out there call “Humor and Prozac,” or “Prose and Prozac.” I wonder if Dave Barry is depressive.

After candid , chutzpah is the best word for this memoir. Chutzpah translates loosely as “walking where angels fear to tread,” and also involves refusing to take no for an answer. When Buchwald first makes his pitch to become an entertainment columnist to Eric Hawkins of the European edition of the Herald-Tribune, for instance, Hawkins listens none too attentively, then says, “We’re not interested and, even if we were, we wouldn’t hire you to write it. Now get out of here.” Interpreting Hawkins’ words not as a rejection but as a challenge, Buchwald waited until Hawkins was out of town, pitched another editor and was hired.

On another occasion, pursuing an after-school job at Paramount Pictures in New York, Buchwald made a cold call at the personnel office. Seeing the name John O’Connell on the glass door, Buchwald had an idea. “I went in and declared to the lady at the desk, “Father Murphy sent me.” I had uttered the magic words . . . He rose to greet me warmly. “How is Father Murphy?” he wanted to know.

“He’s just fine and he sends his best. He thought that you might have a job for one of this students . . .”

Buchwald landed the job of his dreams. Chutzpah.

His career as a Marine and his time at USC were primarily uneventful (although his lasting relationship with his Marine drill instructor says a lot about the man). I’ll look forward to the next installment of Buchwald’s memoirs, perhaps title “Son of Leaving Home,” or, “Leaving Home II, Coming Back to America,” already optioned for the movies by Paramount, starring Eddy Murphy as Art Buchwald, with Sly Stallone as Cher, and Ross Perot as himself.