Charles Bukowski

There will always be something to ruin our lives, it all depends on what or which finds us first. We are always ripe and ready to be taken.

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

To not to have entirely wasted one's life seems to be a worthy accomplishment, if only for myself.

Much publishing is done through politics, friends, and natural stupidity.

I used to live on one candy bar a day - it cost a nickel. I always remember the candy bar was called Payday. That was my payday. And that candy bar tasted so good, at night I would take one bite, and it was so beautiful.

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

Sometimes I've called writing a disease. If so, I'm glad that it caught me.

Somebody once asked me what my theory of life was, and I said, 'Don't try.' That fits the writing, too. I don't try; I just type.

Never get out of bed before noon.

The more cats you have, the longer you live. If you have a hundred cats, you'll live 10 times longer than if you have 10. Someday this will be discovered, and people will have a thousand cats and live forever. It's truly ridiculous.

I have no definite talent or trade, and how I stay alive is largely a matter of magic.

Never envy a man his lady. Behind it all lays a living hell.

Generally, a writer of force is anywhere from 20 years to 200 years ahead of his generation.

Most poets are young simply because they have not been caught up. Show me an old poet, and I'll show you, more often than not, either a madman or a master... it's when you begin to lie to yourself in a poem in order simply to make a poem that you fail. That is why I do not rework poems.

Between the ages of fifteen and twenty-four, I must have read a whole library.

Shakespeare didn't work at all for me.

In my work, as a writer, I only photograph, in words, what I see.

My writing is jagged and harsh, I want it to remain that way; I don't want it smoothed out.

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.

Joan of Arc had style. Jesus had style.