Quotes from Charles Bukowski

the lies of centuries, the lies of love, the lies of Socrates and Blake and Christ will be your bedmates and tombstones in a death that will never end.

often it takes a lifetime to learn how to react to certain critical situations. it's worth waiting for the arrival of maturity and confidence. try it sometime and see how delightful it is to feel powerful and alive.

Brush your teeth with gasoline. Sleep all day and climb trees at night. Be a monk and drink buckshot and beer. Hold your head under water and play the violin. Do a belly dance before pink candles. Kill your dog. Run for mayor. Live in a barrel. Break your head with a hatchet. Plant tulips in the rain. But don't write any more poetry.

Henry Chinaski, the principal said over the microphone. And I walked forward. There was no applause. The one kindly soul in the audience gave two or three clasps.

it's moments like this - you can feel it happening - that you grow transformed partly into something else strange and unimaginable— so when death comes it can only take part of you rom "8 Count Concerto

and gamblers are dry and empty souls, their hearts have been sucked dry, there's no music in their walk, they are colorless and condemned.

the bar was the best place to hide in. time came under your control, time to wade in, time to do nothing in. no guru was needed, no god. nothing expected but yourself and nothing lost to the unexpected.

There is always one woman to save you from another And as that woman saves you she makes ready to destroy.

My eyes were blue and my shoes were old and nobody loved me. But I had things to do.

to die with your boots on while writing poetry is not as glorious as riding a horse down Broadway with a stick of dynamite in your teeth

We are simply a part of the machinery of the moment.

The free soul is rare, but you know it when you see it. Basically because you feel good, very good, when you are near or with them...

In the old days,' he said, 'writers' lives were more interesting than their writing. Now-a-days neither their lives nor the writing is interesting.

If I'm intelligent at all I'll stay out of the woman game. But it's difficult. I had four years of perfect solitude and strength and then one knocked on the door...

Before, they wouldn't speak to each other. Now they were mobilized. The Tribe was in danger.

Nekalayla claimed he had once been walking through the desert when he met Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ told him everything. They sat on a rock together and J.C. laid it on him. Now he was passing the secrets on to those who could afford it. He also held a service every Sunday. His help, who were also his followers, rang in and out on timeclocks.

I'm quitting. Quitting? Yes, you can't blame a man for wanting to better himself.

I once lay in a white hospital for the dying and the dying self, where some god pissed a rain of reason to make things grow only to die

love means eventual pain victory means eventual defeat

when confronted with dutiful policemen or women in rancor I have nothing to say to them for if I truly began it would end in somebody's death: theirs or mine so I let them have their little victories which they need far more than I do.

Writing is when I fly, writing is when I start fires. Writing is when I take death out of my left pocket, throw him against the wall and catch him as he bounces back.

Do you believe in bravery? I like to see it anywhere, in animals, birds, reptiles, humans. Why? Why? It makes me feel good. It's a matter of style in the face of no chance at all.

Jag föddes för att kränga rosor på de dödas avenyer

Humanity, you never had it from the beginning