Charles Bukowski

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

"An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way. An artist says a hard thing in a simple way."

"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."

"It's possible to love a human being if you don't know them too well."

"We're all going to die, all of us, what a circus! That alone should make us love each other but it doesn't. We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities, we are eaten up by nothing."

"Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must lead."

"If you're losing your soul and you know it, then you've still got a soul left to lose"

"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."

"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."

"what matters most is how well you walk through the fire"

"I carry death in my left pocket. Sometimes I take it out and talk to it: "Hello, baby, how you doing? When you coming for me? I'll be ready."

"and our few good times will be rare because we have the critical senseand are not easy to fool with laughter"

"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."

"Boring damned people. All over the earth. Propagating more boring damned people. What a horror show. The earth swarmed with them."

"My dear,Find what you love and let it kill you.Let it drain you of your all. Let it cling onto your back and weigh you down into eventual nothingness.Let it kill you and let it devour your remains.For all things will kill you, both slowly and fastly, but it’s much better to be killed by a lover.~ Falsely yours"

"To do a dull thing with style-now that's what I call art."

"Sometimes you just have to pee in the sink."

"when I am feelinglowall i have to do iswatch my catsand mycouragereturns"

"my mother, poor fish,wanting to be happy, beaten two or three times aweek, telling me to be happy: "Henry, smile!why don't you ever smile?"and then she would smile, to show me how, and it was thesaddest smile I ever saw"

"be it peace or happinesslet it enfold you"