Quotes from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“There is only one place to write and that is alone at a typewriter. The writer who has to go into the streets is a writer who does not know the streets. . . when you leave your typewriter you leave your machine gun and the rats come pouring through.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“the soul has no skin; the soul only has insides that want to sing, finally, can't you hear it, brothers? softly, can't you hear it, brothers? a hot piece of ass and a new Cadillac ain't going to solve a god-damned thing.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“Baby, in a couple of minutes I'm going to rip off your god damned panties and show you some turkey neck you'll remember all the way to the graveside. I have a vast and curved penis, like a sickle, and many a gutted pussy has gasped come upon my callous and roach-smeared rug. First let me finish this drink.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“To be young is the only religion.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“and if I have any advice to give to anybody it’s this: take up watercolor painting.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“Beautiful thoughts, and beautiful women never last.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“Experience can dull. With most men experience is a series of mistakes; the more experience you have the less you know.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“No pain means the end of feeling; each of our joys is a bargain with the devil.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“One more drink and you're dead. This is no way to talk to a suicide head.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“it was going to be all right.
at last.
for a while.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“There is only one place to write and that is alone at a typewriter. A writer who has to go into the streets is a writer who does not know the streets.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“Listen, friend, he said, this whole game is just one big deck of cards. if you want to get into the game you have to take whatever comes up in the shuffle.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“Once in a rare lifetime have you ever been in a roomful of people who only helped you when you looked at them, listened to them. this was one of those magic times. I knew it.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“it was a beauty fire, it contained soul, the sides of sunshine mountains, hot streams of smiling fish, warm stockings smelling a bit like toast. I held my hand over the little flame. I had beautiful hands. that one thing I had. I had beautiful hands.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“Nothing against the law ever cease to exist.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“did she love you?
only as an extension of herself.
what else can love be?
the common sense to care very much for something very good. it needn't be related by bloodline. it can be a red beachball or a piece of buttered toast.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“rewolucja - to brzmi bardzo romantycznie, ale takim nie jest. rewolucja to krew, flaki i obłęd; to małe dzieci, które zabito, bo akurat wlazły pod nogi; małe dzieci, które nie są w stanie zrozumieć, co się tu, do kurwy nędzy, dzieje; to twoja dziwka, to twoja żona, której bagnetem rozpruto brzuch, a potem zgwałcono w dupę na twych oczach; to ludzie, którzy kiedyś śmiali się na filmach z Myszką Miki, a teraz torturują swych pobratymców, zanim się więc na to zdecydujesz, to wcześniej zastanów się, dokąd może zaprowadzić uniesienie i co z niego zostanie, gdy już będzie po wszystkim”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“Když chce někdo zabít Boha, znamená to, že ho chci zabít i já?”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“(by the way . . . I realize I switch from present to past tense, and if you don't like it . . . ram a nipple up your scrotum. -printer: leave this in.)”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“Beynime bir soluk hava çekebilmek için savaşmaktan bıktım. Yıllarca insanlardan kaçmamın nedeni bu, ve onlarla görüşmeye başladığımdan beri inime dönme zamanının geldiğini hissediyorum.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“That was love, that was bravery. Shit, who could really stand me? anyone who could stand me had a lot of forgiveness of soul.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“He, and all of us, are the victims of an attitude that has been growing in our land for nearly a decade - an attitude that says a man can choose the laws he must obey, that he can take the law into his own hands for a cause, that crime does not necessarily mean punishment.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“is it possible to love a human being?
of course, especially if you don’t know them too well. I like to watch them through my window, walking down the street.
Stirkoff, you’re a coward.
of course, sir.
what is your definition of a coward?
a man who would think twice before fighting a lion with his bare hands.
and what is your definition of a brave man?
a man who doesn’t know what a lion is.
every man knows what a lion is.
every man assumes that he does.
and what is your definition of a fool?
a man who doesn’t realize that Time, Structure and Flesh are being mostly wasted.
who then is a wise man?
there aren’t any wise men, sir.
then there can’t be any fools. if there isn’t any night there can’t be any day; if there isn’t any white there can’t be any black.
I’m sorry, sir. I thought that everything was what it was, not depending on something else”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“so we went up the hill. then we got into my room and I looked at them both. my pure and beautiful slim and magic little girl glorious fuck with the hair dangling down to the asshole, and next to her the tragedy of the ages: slime and horror, the machine gone wrong, frogs tortured by little boys and head-on car collisions and the spider taking in the ball-less buzzing fly and the landscape brain of Primo Carnera going down under the dull playboy guns of cocksure Maxie Baer — new heavyweight champ of America — I, I rushed at the Tragedy of the Ages — that fat slob of accumulated shit.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“I talked to Miriam. She says you paint and write, you're an artist"
"at rare times I'm an artist; at most other times I'm nothing”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“I get very tired of the precious intellects who must speak diamonds every time they open their mouths. I get tired of battling for each space of air for the mind. that’s why I stayed away from people for so long, and now that I am meeting people, I find that I must return to my cave. there are other things beside the mind: there are insects and palm trees and pepper shakers, and I’ll have a pepper-shaker in my cave, so laugh.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“whatya wanna hear on the juke?” I asked. “anything. anything you like.” I loaded the thing. I didn’t know who I was but I could load a juke box.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“WHEN YOU LEAVE YOUR TYPEWRITER YOU LEAVE YOUR MACHINE GUN AND THE RATS COME POURING THROUGH.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“Devrim sözcüğü kulağınıza hoş geliyor, değil mi? ama hiç öyle değildir, inanın bana. devrimin ne olduğunu bilmek ister misiniz? kan, bağırsak ve delilik. yolunuza çıktığı için ölen çocuklar, dünyadan habersiz yavrular. yanınızdaki kaltağın, hatta karınızın gözünüzün önünde kasaturalanıp ırzına geçilmesidir. bir zamanlar miki fare filmlerine gülen erkeklerin birbirine işkence etmeleridir. böyle bir eyleme geçmeden önce eylemin ruhunun nerede olduğunu ve eylem bittiğinde nerede olacağını çok iyi düşünmek gerek. Dostoyevski'nin Suç ve Ceza'sına katılmıyorum, koşullar ne olursa olsun kimseyi öldürme meselesi. ama iyi düşünmek gerek. işin delirtici yanı tek bir mermi bile sıkmadan canlarımızı alıyor olmaları. para babalarının şişko oğulları Beverly Hills'de on dört yaşında kızların ırzlarına geçerken ben bir yerlerde asgari ücretle belimi kırıyordum. helada beş dakika fazla kaldığı için işten kovulan adamlar biliyorum. anlatmak istemediğim çok şey gördüm. ama bir şeyi öldürmeden önce yerine daha iyisini koyabileceğinden emin olmalısın. parklarda nefret palavraları sıkan siyasi fırsatçılardan daha iyi bir şeyler olmalı elinizde. bir şeyin bedelini ödemek canınıza okuyacaksa otuz altı aylık garantiden fazlasını arayın. devrime duyulan romantik özlemin dışında bir şey göremedim henüz. ne gerçek bir lider ne de şimdiye kadar her devrim sonrası gelen ihanetin önüne geçebilecek bir platform. şayet birini yok edeceksem o adamın yerine karbon kopyasının gelmesini istemem. tarihi bar helasında barbut oynayan ayyaşlar gibi harcadık. insan ırkından utanç duyuyorum, ama bu utanca katkıda bulunmanın da bir anlamı yok. elimden gelirse utancı azaltmak isterim.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

“that’s what friendship means: sharing the prejudice of experience.”
― Charles Bukowski, quote from Notes of a Dirty Old Man

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“I saw thee once - only once - years ago:
I must not say how many - but not many.
It was a July midnight; and from out
A full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring,
Sought a precipitate pathway up through heaven,
There fell a silvery-silken veil of light,
With quietude, and sultriness, and slumber,
Upon the upturn'd faces of a thousand
Roses that grew in an enchanted garden,
Where no wind dared stir, unless on tiptoe -
Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses
That gave out, in return for the love-light,
Their odorous souls in an ecstatic death -
Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses
That smiled and died in the parterre, enchanted
By thee, and by the poetry of thy presence.

Clad all in white, upon a violet bank
I saw thee half reclining; while the moon
Fell upon the upturn'd faces of the roses,
And on thine own, upturn'd - alas, in sorrow!

Was it not Fate, that, on this July midnight -
Was it not Fate, (whose name is also Sorrow,)
That bade me pause before that garden-gate,
To breathe the incense of those slumbering roses?
No footsteps stirred: the hated world all slept,
Save only thee and me. (Oh, Heaven! - oh, G**!
How my heart beats in coupling those two words!)
Save only thee and me. I paused - I looked -
And in an instant all things disappeared.
(Ah, bear in mind the garden was enchanted!)
The pearly lustre of the moon went out:
The mossy banks and the meandering paths,
The happy flowers and the repining trees,
Were seen no more: the very roses' odors
Died in the arms of the adoring airs.
All - all expired save thee - save less than thou:
Save only divine light in thine eyes -
Save but the soul in thine uplifted eyes.
I saw but them - they were the world to me.
I saw but them - saw only them for hours -
Saw only them until the moon went down.
What wild heart-histories seemed to lie enwritten
Upon those crystalline, celestial spheres!
How dark a wo! yet how sublime a hope!
How silently serene a sea of pride!
How daring an ambition! yet how deep -
How fathomless a capacity for love!
But now, at length, dear Dian sank from sight,
Into a western couch of thunder-cloud;
And thou, a ghost, amid the entombing trees
Didst glide away. Only thine eyes remained.
They would not go - they never yet have gone.
Lighting my lonely pathway home that night,
They have not left me (as my hopes have) since.
They follow me - they lead me through the years.
They are my ministers - yet I their slave.
Their office is to illumine and enkindle -
My duty, to be saved by their bright fire,
And purified in their electric fire,
And sanctified in their elysian fire.
They fill my soul with Beauty (which is Hope,)
And are far up in Heaven - the stars I kneel to
In the sad, silent watches of my night;
While even in the meridian glare of day
I see them still - two sweetly scintillant
Venuses, unextinguished by the sun!”
― Edgar Allan Poe, quote from The Raven and Other Poems

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