Charles Bukowski Quotes page 5 554 Quotes for Challenging, Inspiring, and Questioning Life&#39;s Perspectives

“When I begin to doubt my ability to work the word, I simply read another writer and know I have nothing to worry about. My contest is only with myself, to do it right, with power, and force, and delight, and gamble.”

“having nothing to struggle
against
they have nothing to struggle
for.”

“I
think that the
world should be full of cats and full of rain, that's all, just
cats and
rain, rain and cats, very nice, good
night.”

Source: You Get So Alone at Times That it Just Makes Sense

Charles Bukowski book Betting on the Muse: Poems and Stories

Source: Betting on the Muse: Poems and Stories

“It seemed better to delay thinking.”

“That’s when I first learned that it wasn’t enough to just do your job, you had to have an interest in it, even a passion for it.”

Source: Ham on Rye

“I have one problem, I don’t hate people. They disgust me and I want to get away from them. I do not have hatred. I have an escape mechanism.”

“Getting drunk was good. I decided that I would always like getting drunk. It took away the obvious and maybe if you could get away from the obvious often enough, you wouldn't become so obvious yourself.”

“and getting dressed we talk about what else there might be to do, but being together solves most of it, in fact, solves all of it”

Source: Ham on Rye

Charles Bukowski book Mockingbird Wish Me Luck

Source: Mockingbird Wish Me Luck

“I knew it would be you”

“this time has finished me.”

Source: You Get So Alone at Times That it Just Makes Sense

“a good book
can make an almost
impossible
existence,
liveable

( from 'the luck of the word' )”

Source: Love Is a Dog from Hell

Charles Bukowski book Betting on the Muse: Poems and Stories

Source: Betting on the Muse: Poems and Stories

“Most people are not ready for death, theirs or anybody elses.”

“Everything is beautiful. We have all this beauty in the world and all we have to do is reach out and touch it, it is all there and all ours for the taking." -- Cecilia to Henry Chinaski, liberty taken changing past tense to present tense (173)”

Source: The Captain is Out to Lunch and the Sailors Have Taken Over the Ship

“eleven months.

now she's gone
gone as they go.”

Source: Women

“the worst thing," he told me,
"is bitterness, people end up so
bitter.”

Source: Love Is a Dog from Hell

“There's no way I can stop writing, it's a form of insanity.”

Source: You Get So Alone at Times That it Just Makes Sense

“At the age of 25 most people were finished. A whole god-damned nation of assholes driving automobiles, eating, having babies, doing everything in the worst way possible, like voting for the presidential candidate who reminded them most of themselves.”

Source: Women

“When you clean up a city, you destroy it.”

Ham On Rye (1982)
Source: Ham on Rye
Context: The problem was you had to keep choosing between one evil or another, and no matter what you chose, they sliced a little more off you, until there was nothing left. At the age of 25 most people were finished. A whole goddamned nation of assholes driving automobiles, eating, having babies, doing everything in the worst way possible, like voting for the presidential candidate who reminded them most of themselves. I had no interests. I had no interest in anything. I had no idea how I was going to escape. At least the others had some taste for life. They seemed to understand something that I didn't understand. Maybe I was lacking. It was possible. I often felt inferior. I just wanted to get away from them. But there was no place to go.

“there must be a way.

surely there must be a way that we have not yet
thought of.

who put this brain inside of me?

it cries
it demands
it says that there is a chance.

it will not say
"no.”

“What? You’d dare drink right after getting out of jail for intoxication?”
That’s when you need a drink the most.”

Source: Love Is a Dog from Hell

Charles Bukowski book Factotum

Source: Factotum

“it doesn't matter if Prince Charles falls off his horse
or that the hummingbird is so seldom
seen
or that we are too senseless to go
insane.

coffee. give us more of that NOTHING
coffee.”

“I'm not the cruel type, but they are, and that's the secret.”

Source: You Get So Alone at Times That it Just Makes Sense

Charles Bukowski book Tales of Ordinary Madness

Source: Tales of Ordinary Madness

“mercy, I think, doesn't the human race know anything about mercy?”

“I have gotten so used to melancholia that I greet it like an old friend.”

Source: Love Is a Dog from Hell

“Sometimes a man doesn’t know what to do about things and sometimes it’s best to lie very still and try not to think at all about anything.”

Source: Love Is a Dog from Hell

“So, that’s what they wanted: lies. Beautiful lies. That’s what they needed. People were fools. It was going to be easy for me.”

Source: Burning in Water, Drowning in Flame

“Look, let me put it this way: with me, you’re number one and there isn’t even a number two.”

Source: Ham on Rye

“I'm too careless. I don't put out enough effort. I'm tired.”

Source: Women

Charles Bukowski book South of No North

Source: South of No North

“people diminish me;
the longer I sit and listen to them
the more empty I feel but I don't get
the idea that they feel empty, I feel
that they enjoy the sound from their
mouths.”

“writing about a writer's block is better than not writing at all”

Source: Bone Palace Ballet

“I tell you such fine music waits in the shadows of hell.”

Source: The Last Night of the Earth Poems

“Humanity, you never had it from the beginning." That was my motto.”

Source: The Last Night of the Earth Poems

“they say that
nothing is wasted:
either that
or
it al is”

Source: Women

“I was their bar freak, they needed me
to make themselves feel
better.
just like, at times, I needed that
graveyard.”

“We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.”

Source: You Get So Alone at Times That it Just Makes Sense

“The night kept coming on in and there was nothing I could do.”

"The Meaning of Life: The Big Picture", Life Magazine (December 1988)
Interviews
Context: For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can't readily accept the God formula, the big answers don't remain stonewritten. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command or faith a dictum. I am my own God. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.

“The wisdom to quit is all we have left.”

Charles Bukowski book The People Look Like Flowers at Last

Source: The People Look Like Flowers at Last

“Many a good man has been put under the bridge by a woman.”

“People don't do me much good.”

Source: Women (1978)