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Charles Bukowski

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Famous Charles Bukowski Quotes

“«... sabes, yo tenía una familia, un trabajo, algo siempre estaba en el medio, pero ahora vendí mi casa, encontré este lugar, un estudio amplio, deberías ver el espacio y la luz. Por primera vez en mi vida voy a tener el lugar y el tiempo para crear.» No nene, si vas a crear vas a crear trabajando 16 horas por día en una mina de carbón, o vas a crear en una piecita con tres chicos mientras estás desocupado, vas a crear aunque te falte parte de tu mente y de tu cuerpo, vas a crear ciego, mutilado, loco, vas a crear con un gato trepando por tu espalda mientras la ciudad entera tiembla en terremotos, bombardeos, inundaciones y fuego. Nene, aire, luz, tiempo y espacio no tienen nada que ver con esto y no crean nada... excepto quizás una vida más larga para encontrar nuevas excusas.”

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Author:Charles Bukowski
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“Žene – voleo sam boje njihove odeće, način na koji hodaju, okrutnost nekih lica, tu i tamo gotovo čistu lepotu nekog lica, totalno i opčinjavajuće ženskog. Prevazišle su nas – mnogo bolje su planirale i mnogo bolje su bile organizovane. Dok su muškarci gledali ragbi, pili pivo ili se kuglali, žene su mislile o nama, proračunavajući nas, donoseći odluke: da li da nas prihvate, odbace, promene, ubiju, ili jednostavno napuste. I na kraju krajeva, sve to nije bilo ni bitno; ma šta one uradile, mi bismo uvek završavali usamljeni i izluđeni…”

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Author:Charles Bukowski
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“welcome to my wormy hell. the music grinds off-key. fish eyes watch from the wall. this is where the last happy shot was fired. the mind snaps closed like a mind snapping closed. we need to discover a new will and a new way. we're stuck here now listening to the laughter of the gods. my temples ache with the fact of the facts. I get up, move about, scratch myself. I'm a pawn. I am a hungry prayer. my wormy hell welcomes you. hello, hello there. come in, come on in! plenty of room here for us all, sucker. we can only blame ourselves so come sit with me in the dark. it's half-past nowhere everywhere.”

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Book:The Pleasures of the Damned
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“The nights you fight best are when all the weapons are pointed at you, when all the voices hurl their insults while the dream is being strangled. The nights you fight best are when reason gets kicked in the gut, when the chariots of gloom encircle you. The nights you fight best are when the laughter of fools fills the air, when the kiss of death is mistaken for love. The nights you fight best are when the game is fixed, when the crowd screams for your blood. The nights you fight best are on a night like this as you chase a thousand dark rats from your brain, as you rise up against the impossible, as you become a brother to the tender sister of joy and move on regardless.”

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Author:Charles Bukowski
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“I know a woman who keeps buying puzzles chinese puzzles blocks wires pieces that finally fit into some order. she works it out mathmatically she solves all her puzzles lives down by the sea puts sugar out for the ants and believes ultimately in a better world. her hair is white she seldom combs it her teeth are snaggled and she wears loose shapeless coveralls over a body most women would wish they had. for many years she irritated me with what I considered her eccentricities- like soaking eggshells in water (to feed the plants so that they'd get calcium). but finally when I think of her life and compare it to other lives more dazzling, original and beautiful I realize that she has hurt fewer people than anybody I know (and by hurt I simply mean hurt). she has had some terrible times, times when maybe I should have helped her more for she is the mother of my only child and we were once great lovers, but she has come through like I said she has hurt fewer people than anybody I know, and if you look at it like that, well, she has created a better world. she has won. Frances, this poem is for you.”

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Book:Love is a Dog From Hell
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“I'd decided the campus was just a place to hide. There were some campus freaks who stayed on forever. The whole college scene was soft. They never told you what to expect out there in the real world. They just crammed you with theory and never told you how hard the pavements were. A college education could destroy an individual for life. Books could make you soft. When you put them down, and really went out there, then you needed to know what they never told you.”

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Book:Ham On Rye
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“You want truth? Fine. Most people die long before the dirt hits them. They smile, obey, sign papers, raise their kids, pay their taxes. But their eyes? Fucking empty. And then there’s you. Still hurting. Still burning. Which means one thing— You’re still alive. So here’s to the broken ones. The reckless saints. The bastards who still feel something. Because dead men don’t cry. But you— you refused to go quietly. And that’s what makes you dangerous. Cheers, love. Keep bleeding. Keep burning. You’ve still got a soul. And the gods? They’re watching.”

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Author:Charles Bukowski
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“In the old days, before I was married, or knew a lot of women, I would just pull down all the shades and go to bed for three or four days. I'd get up to shit. I'd eat a can of beans, go back to bed, just stay there for three or four days. Then I'd put on my clothes and I'd walk outside, and the sunlight was brilliant, and the sounds were great. I felt powerful, like a recharged battery. But you know the first bring-down? The first human face I saw on the sidewalk, I lost half my charge right there.”

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Book:Charles Bukowski: Sunlight Here I Am: Interviews and Encounters 1963-1993
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“Yes Yes when God created love he didn't help most when God created dogs He didn't help dogs when God created plants that was average when God created hate we had a standard utility when God created me He created me when God created the monkey He was asleep when He created the giraffe He was drunk when He created narcotics He was high and when He created suicide He was low when He created you lying in bed He knew what He was doing He was drunk and He was high and He created the mountains and the sea and fire at the same time He made some mistakes but when He created you lying in bed He came all over His Blessed Universe.”

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Author:Charles Bukowski
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“There's nothing to mourn about death any more than there is to mourn about the growing of a flower. What is terrible is not death but the lives people live or don't live up until their death. They don't honor their own lives ... their minds are full of cotton. They swallow God without thinking, they swallow country without thinking. Soon they forget how to think, they let others think for them.... Most people's deaths are a sham. There's nothing left to die.”

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Author:Charles Bukowski
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“The ladies usually go for the biggest damn fool they can find; that is why the human race stands where it does today: we have bred the clever and lasting Casanovas, all hollow inside, like the chocolate Easter bunnies we foster upon our poor children.”

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Book:Notes of a Dirty Old Man
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