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

Discover the words of Charles Bukowski, a legendary writer known for his raw and honest perspective on life. From profound insights to biting sarcasm, delve into a collection of his most famous quotes that will challenge, inspire, and make you question the world around you.

Henry Charles Bukowski was a German-American poet, novelist, and short story writer who became known for his work that addressed the lives of poor Americans, writing, alcohol, relationships with women, and the monotony of work. He published extensively in small literary magazines and with small presses and wrote thousands of poems, hundreds of short stories, and six novels over the course of his career. Although he received little attention from academic critics in the United States during his lifetime, Bukowski gained popularity in Europe, particularly in Germany. He has since been the subject of numerous critical articles and books.

Bukowski was born in Germany to a German father and American mother. His family immigrated to Los Angeles when he was a child. Growing up, Bukowski faced abuse from his father and struggles with his appearance due to extreme acne. The Great Depression further fueled his rage as he witnessed economic hardships. In his early teens, Bukowski discovered alcohol as a coping mechanism. After quitting college at the start of World War II, he moved to New York City in hopes of becoming a writer. However, it wasn't until he was treated for a near-fatal bleeding ulcer in 1955 that he began seriously writing poetry. Over time, he formed relationships with various women that provided material for his stories and poems. In 1969 at age 49, Bukowski quit his job at the post office to dedicate himself full-time to writing after receiving an offer from Black Sparrow Press publisher John Martin. He continued to submit works to small independent presses throughout his career until his death from leukemia at the age of 73 in March 1994.

✵ 16. August 1920 – 9. March 1994  •  Other names Henry Charles Bukowski
Charles Bukowski photo
Charles Bukowski: 555 quotes288 likes

Charles Bukowski Quotes

“if you think they didn't go crazy
in tiny rooms just like you're doing now without women without food without hope then you're not ready.”

Charles Bukowski book Love Is a Dog from Hell

Source: Love Is a Dog from Hell

“Turgenev was a very serious fellow but he could make me laugh because a truth first encountered can be very funny. When someone else's truth is the same as your truth, and he seems to be saying it just for you, that's great.”

Charles Bukowski book Ham on Rye

Source: Ham on Rye

“She was perfect, pure maddening sex, and she knew it, and she played on it, dripped it, and allowed you to suffer for it.”

Charles Bukowski book Factotum

Source: Factotum

“as a child
i suppose
i was not quite
normal.


my happiest times were
when
i was left alone in
the house on a
saturday.”

Charles Bukowski

“I can't blame her. but
wonder why she's here with
me? where are the other
guys? how can you be
lucky? having someone the
others have abandoned?”

Charles Bukowski

“It wasn't my day. My week. My month. My year. My life. God damn it.”

Charles Bukowski book Pulp

Variant: It wasn’t my day. My week. My month. My year. My life. God damn it.
Source: Pulp

“Only the boring get bored”

Charles Bukowski

“Some people have written that my writing has helped them go on.
It has helped me too. The writing, the roses, the 9 cats.”

Charles Bukowski

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

“not writing is not good but trying to write when you can't is worse.”

Charles Bukowski

Source: The Last Night of the Earth Poems

“Everything you own must be able to fit inside one suitcase; then your mind might be free.”

Charles Bukowski

Source: Portions from a Wine-Stained Notebook: Uncollected Stories and Essays, 1944-1990

“I got up and walked back to my roominghouse. The moonlight was bright. My footsteps echoed in the empty street and it sounded as if somebody was following me, I looked around. I was mistaken. I was quite alone.”

Charles Bukowski book Factotum

Source: Factotum

“as the shadows assume
shapes
I fight the slow
retreat

now
my once-promise
dwindling
dwindling

now
lighting new cigarettes
pouring more
drinks

it has been a beautiful
fight

still
is.”

Charles Bukowski

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

“People just weren't interesting. Maybe they weren't supposed to be. But animals, birds, even insects were. I couldn't understand it.”

Charles Bukowski book Hollywood

Source: Hollywood

“I like the way Mahler wandered about in his music and still retained his
passion. He must have looked like an
earthquake walking down the street.”

Charles Bukowski

Source: What Matters Most is How Well You Walk Through the Fire

“human relationships simply aren't
durable.
I think back to the women in
my life.
they seem non-existent.”

Charles Bukowski book Love Is a Dog from Hell

Source: Love Is a Dog from Hell

“bad writing's like bad women: there's just not much you can do about it”

Charles Bukowski book Tales of Ordinary Madness

Source: Tales of Ordinary Madness

Charles Bukowski quote: “too often, the only escape is sleep”

“too often, the only escape is sleep”

Charles Bukowski

“I was glad I wasn’t in love, that I wasn’t happy with the world. I like being at odds with everything. People in love often become edgy, dangerous. They lose their sense of perspective.”

Charles Bukowski book Women

Source: Women (1978)
Context: I was glad I wasn't in love, that I wasn't happy with the world. I like being at odds with everything. People in love often become edgy, dangerous. They lose their sense of perspective. They lose their sense of humor. They become nervous, psychotic bores. They even become killers.

“A woman must be nursed into subsistence by love, where a man can become stronger by being hated." - from 'Cows in Art Class”

Charles Bukowski

“Let' em learn or let' em die”

Charles Bukowski book Post Office

Post Office

“our bones
like stems into the sky
will forever cry
victory”

Charles Bukowski

“All a guy needed was a chance. Somebody was alway controlling who got a chance and who didn't.”

Charles Bukowski book Ham on Rye

Source: Ham on Rye

“I was getting depressed. My life wasn't going anywhere. I needed something, the flashing of lights, glamour, some damn thing. And here I was, talking to the dead. I finished my first drink. The second was ready.”

Charles Bukowski book Pulp

Source: Pulp

“There still might be a place for us somewhere.”

Charles Bukowski

“There is always somebody about to ruin your day, if not your life.”

Charles Bukowski book Pulp

Source: Pulp

“well, death says, as he walks by, I'm going to get you anyhow no matter what you've been: writer, cab-driver, pimp, butcher, sky-diver, I'm going to get you”

Charles Bukowski

Source: The Last Night of the Earth Poems

“I read my books at night, like that, under the quilt with the overheated reading lamp. Reading all those good lines while suffocating. It was magic.”

Charles Bukowski

“the gods play no
favorites.”

Charles Bukowski

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

“If I bet on humanity, I'd never cash a ticket.”

Charles Bukowski

“It didn't pay to trust another human being. Humans didn't have it, whatever it took.”

Charles Bukowski book Ham on Rye

Source: Ham on Rye

“The trouble with these people is that their cities have never been bombed and their mothers have never been told to shut up.”

Charles Bukowski

“I would certainly end up forever crying the blues into a
coffee cup in a park for old men playing
chess or silly games of some sort.”

Charles Bukowski book The People Look Like Flowers at Last

Source: The People Look Like Flowers at Last

“you are
yesterday's
bouquet so sadly
raided”

Charles Bukowski

Source: The Roominghouse Madrigals: Early Selected Poems, 1946-1966

“That's the way it ends. The thin edge of the wedge.”

Charles Bukowski

“Tell him to seek the stars and he will kill himself with climbing.”

Charles Bukowski

Source: The Roominghouse Madrigals: Early Selected Poems, 1946-1966

“Are you anti-black?
I'm anti-everything.”

Charles Bukowski book Women

Source: Women

“Existence was not only absurd, it was plain hard work. Think of how many times you put on your underwear in a lifetime. It was appalling, it was disgusting, it was stupid.”

Charles Bukowski book Pulp

Source: Pulp

“since some people had told me that I was ugly, I always preferred shade to the sun, darkness to light”

Charles Bukowski book Ham on Rye

Source: Ham on Rye

“You don't go on "probably" when love and guns are in hand.”

Charles Bukowski book Pulp

Source: Pulp

“You get so alone at times that it just makes sense.”

Charles Bukowski

“I run with the hunted.”

Charles Bukowski

Variant: Run with the hunted.

“It will rain all this night and we will sleep transfixed by the dark water as our blood runs through our fragile life.”

Charles Bukowski