Charles Bukowski Quotes

Liquor is not a necessity. It is a means of momentarily sidestepping necessity.

I find drinking really helps.

I never got to the point when I felt like running away from it all.

The sky was falling down on me and I spent most of the time drunk. It was the only way I could handle it.

Beer. Now there's a temporary solution.

By forgetting the past and by throwing myself into other interests, I forget to worry.

I'll close my eyes really, really tight and make you all go away.

Sometimes it's a relief just to focus on putting one foot in front of the other.

The weight of the world on my shoulders was something that I had to let go.

I have to throw off the burden and the pressure.

In terms of, like, instant relief, canceling plans is like heroin.

Sometimes...I just want to run away from it all

I know something about dread myself, and appreciate the elaborate systems with which some people fill the void, appreciate all the opiates of the people, whether they are as accessible as alcohol and heroin and promiscuity or as hard to come by as faith in God or History.

[Smoking] was a comfort, an occupation, a drug, a casual habit, a distraction, a way to not eat, a way to not pay attention, a way to not feel.

Don't you ever feel that - that you just need to get away? From everything? That it's all too much?

Escape through travel works. Almost from the moment I boarded my flight, life in England became meaningless. Seat-belt signs lit up, problems switched off. Broken armrests took precedence over broken hearts. By the time the plane was airborne I'd forgotten England even existed.

When Hailey was born my first thought was that I needed a drink and that hospitals should have bars in them.

Leaving feels too good, once you leave.

It's an enormous relief to go to work and be an actor and not be worried about writing.

At times like this, adults need a drink

That's what I wanted for myself for even just a little while-to be unaware of the rest of the world. I needed some time.

Well, don't we all feel like jumping to the end of the world sometimes?

There's a lot of political things happening out there that I'd really have to get away from.

Most of us do not take these situations as teachings. We automatically hate them. We run like crazy. We use all kinds of ways to escape - all addictions stem from this moment when we meet our edge and we just can't stand it. We feel we have to soften it, pad it with something, and we become addicted to whatever it is that seems to ease the pain.

The bowl dispels corroding cares.