Charles Bukowski

people are not good to each other. perhaps if they were our deaths would not be so sad.

I take much pleasure in being alone but there is also a strange warm grace in not being alone.

the impossibility of being human all too human this breathing in and out out and in these punks these cowards these champions these mad dogs of glory moving this little bit of light toward us impossibly.

some men never die and some men never live but we're all alive tonight.

To create art means to be crazy alone forever.

Why did I come here? I thought. Why is it always only a matter of choosing between something bad and something worse?

I give you soul. I give you wisdom and light and music and a bit of laughter. Also, I am the world's greatest horseplayer.

The secret is writing down one simple line after another.

I felt I had to win. It seemed very important. I didn't know why it was important and I kept thinking, why do I think this is so important? And another part of me answered, just because it is.

There's a light somewhere. It may not be much light but it beats the darkness.

Beauty is nothing, beauty won’t stay. You don’t know how lucky you are to be ugly, because if people like you, you know it’s for something else.

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.

There still might be a place for us somewhere.

The writer has no responsibility other than to jack off in bed alone and write a good page.

As a recluse I couldn't bear traffic. It had nothing to do with jealousy, I simply disliked people, crowds, anywhere, except at my readings. People diminished me, they sucked me dry.

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

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

Few beautiful women were willing to indicate in public that they belonged to someone. I had known enough women to realize this. I accepted them for what they were and love came hard and very seldom. When it did it was usually for the wrong reasons. One simply became tired of holding back love and let it go because it needed some place to go. Then, usually, there was trouble.

I knew I was strong, and maybe like they said, "crazy." But I had this feeling inside of me that something real was there.

They swallow God without thinking, they swallow country without thinking. Soon they forget how to think, they let others think for them.

It’s the order of things: each one gets a taste of honey then the knife.