Charles Bukowski Quotes

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554 Quotes for Challenging, Inspiring, and Questioning Life's Perspectives

“I never met another man I'd rather be. And even if that's a delusion, it's a lucky one.”

“The difference between a democracy and a dictatorship is that in a democracy you vote first and take orders later; in a dictatorship you don't have to waste your time voting”

“I drive around the streets
an inch away from weeping,
ashamed of my sentimentality and
possible love.”

“each man's hell is in a different place:
mine is just up and behind
my ruined face.”

“she is no longer
the beautiful woman
she was. she sends
photos of herself
sitting upon a rock
by the ocean
alone and damned.
I could have had
her once. I wonder
if she thinks I
could have
saved her?”

“It was like the beginning of life and laughter. It was the real meaning of the sun”

“In the morning it was morning and I was still alive.”

“The trouble with a mask is it never changes”

“if you get married they think you're
finished
and if you are without a woman they think you're
incomplete.”

“the tigers have found me
and I do not care.”

“Women were meant to suffer; no wonder they asked for constant declarations of love”

“But most men, fortunately, aren't writers, or even cab drivers, and some men - many men - unfortunately aren't anything.”

“Maybe she hadn’t saved the world but she had made a major improvement.”

“nobody can save you but yourself and you’re worth saving. it’s a war not easily won but if anything is worth winning then this is it.”

“nothing can save
you
except
writing.
it keeps the walls
from
failing.”

“so it's always a process of letting go, one way or another”

“People are strange: They are constantly angered by trivial things, but on a major matter like totally wasting their lives, they hardly seem to notice.”

“He asked, "What makes a man a writer?" "Well," I said, "it's simple. You either get it down on paper, or jump off a bridge.”

“I wasn't a misanthrope and I wasn't a misogynist but I liked being alone. It felt good to sit alone in a small space and smoke and drink. I had always been good company for myself.”

“writers are desperate people and when they stop being desperate they stop being writers.”

“I had noticed that both in the very poor and very rich extremes of society the mad were often allowed to mingle freely.”

“Any asshole can chase a skirt, art takes discipline.”

“whiskey makes the heart beat faster
but it sure doesn't help the
mind and isn't it funny how you can ache just
from the deadly drone of
existence?”

“Learn, he says, that there will be hours, days
and months ahead of feeling absolutely terrible
and nothing can change that; neither new
girlfriends, health professionals, changes of diet, dope, humility, or
God.”

“to fight for each minute is to
fight for what is possible within
yourself,
so that your life and your death
will not be like
theirs.”

“and then there are some who
believe that old
relationships can be
revived and made new
again.

but please
if you feel that way

don't phone
don't write
don't arrive”

“It was a joy! Words weren't dull, words were things that could make your mind hum. If you read them and let yourself feel the magic, you could live without pain, with hope, no matter what happened to you.”

“The more crap you believe, the better off you are.”

“Now something so sad has hold of us that the breath leaves and we can't even cry.”

“I wasn’t lonely. I experienced no self-pity. I was just caught up in a life in which I could find no meaning.”

“Some people like what you do, some people hate what you do, but most people simply don’t give a damn.”

“they thought I had guts
they were wrong
I was only frightened of
more important things”

“I suppose like others
I have come through fire and sword,
love gone wrong,
head-on crashes, drunk at sea,
and I have listened to the simple sound of water running
in tubs
and wished to drown”

“the writing of some
men
is like a vast bridge
that carries you
over
the many things
that claw and tear.

The Wine of Forever”

“Those faces you see every day on the streets were not created entirely without hope: be kind to them: like you they have not escaped.”

“The crazy ones only laugh when there is no reason to laugh.”

“There are only two things wrong with money: too much or too little.”

“the history of melancholia
includes all of us.”

“The best thing about the bedroom was the bed. I liked to stay in bed for hours, even during the day with covers pulled up to my chin. It was good in there, nothing ever occurred in there, no people, nothing.”

“i was born to hustle roses down the avenue of the dead.”

“it seemed to me that I had never met
another person on earth
as discouraging to my happiness
as my father.
and it appeared that I had
the same effect upon
him.”

“But my whole life has been a matter of fighting for one simple hour to do what I want to do. There was always something getting in the way of my getting to myself.”

“Beware
Those Who
Are ALWAYS
READING
BOOKS”

“I’ve had so many knives stuck into me, when they hand me a flower I can’t quite make out what it is. It takes time.”

“For each Joan of Arc there is a Hitler perched at the other end of the teeter-totter. The old story of good and evil.”

“If you are going to try, go all the way or don't even start. If you follow it you will be alive with the gods. It is the only good fight there is.”

“purple does something strange to me”

“when the phone rings
I too would like to hear words
that might ease
some of this.”

“unless the sun inside you is burning your gut, don't do it”