Ham on Rye Quotes

“Instead I learned that the poor usually stay poor. That the young rich smell the stink of the poor and learn to find it a bit amusing.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“It didn’t pay to trust another human being. Humans didn’t have it, whatever it took.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“Jim, did your father really blow his brains out because of your mother?"
"Yeah.He was on the telephone.He told her he had a gun.He said, "If you don't come back to me I'm going to kill myself. Will you come back to me?´ And my mother said, "No." There was a shot and that was that."
"What did your mother do?"
"She hung up."
"All right, I'll see you tonight buddy".”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“The problem was you had
to keep choosing between one evil or another, and no matter what you chose, they sliced a little bit
more off you, until there was nothing left. At the age of 25 most people were finished. A whole goddamned
nation of assholes driving automobiles, eating, having babies, doing everything in the worst
way possible, like voting for the presidential candidate who reminded them most of themselves.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“I think I’m going to die,” the old man said. “I don’t want to die. I’m afraid to die …” “You’ve lived long enough, you old fart!” muttered my father.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“Slova nebyla nudná, slova byla věcmi, které dokázaly přinutit vaši mysl, aby se hýbala. Když jste je četli a nechali se prostoupit tím kouzlem, mohli jste žít bez bolesti, s nadějí, bez ohledu na to, co se vám přihodilo... Četl jsem své knihy po nocích, takhle pod přikrývkou s přehrátou stolní lampou. Četl jsem všechny ty dobré řádky, zatímco jsem se dusil. Bylo to kouzelné.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“The thought of being something didn't only appall me, it sickened me. The thought of being a lawyer or a councilman or an engineer, anything like that, seemed impossible to me. To get married, to have children, to get trapped in the family structure. To go someplace to work every day and to return. It was impossible. To do things, simple things, to be part of family picnics, Christmas, the 4th of July, Labor Day, Mother's Day. . . was a man born just to endure those things and then die?”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“Then I began writing. It was about a German aviator in World War I. Baron Von Himmlen. He flew a red Fokker. And he was not popular with his fellow fliers. He didn't talk to them. He drank alone and he flew alone. He didn't bother with women, although they all loved him. He was above that. He was too busy. He was busy shooting Allied plans out of the sky. Already he had shot down 110 and he war wasn't over. His red Fokker, which he referred to as the "October Bird of Death," was known everywhere. Even the enemy ground troops knew him as he often flew low over them, taking their gunfire and laughing, dropping bottles of champagne to them suspended from little parachutes. Baron Von Himmlen was never attacked by less than five Allied planes at a time. He was an ugly man with scars on his face, but he was beautiful if you looked long enough -- it was in the eyes, his style, his courage, his fierce aloneness.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“The emotion was there but it wasn't spelled out in neon.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“I didn’t know what I wanted. Yes, I did. I wanted someplace to hide out, someplace where one didn’t have to do anything.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“My father didn’t like people. He didn’t like me. “Children should be seen and not heard,” he told me.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“God," prayed my grandmother, "purge the devil from this poor boy's body! Just look at all those sores! They make me sick, God! Look at them! It's the devil, God, dwelling in this boy's body. Purge the devil from his body, Lord!"

"God," said my grandmother, "why do you allow the devil to dwell inside this body's body? Don't you see how the devil is enjoying this? Look at these sores, 0 Lord, I am about to vomit just looking at them! They are red and big and full!”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“Stanley was right. I never hit another home run. I struck out most of the time. But they always remembered that home run and while they still hated me, it was a better kind of hatred, like they weren’t quite sure why. Football”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“Jimmy waited and Clare walked over. She put her face close to mine. She spoke softly so Jimmy wouldn’t hear. “Listen, Honey, any time you really want to graduate, I can arrange to give you your diploma.” “Thanks, Clare, I might be seeing you.” “I’ll rip your balls off, Henry!” “I don’t doubt it, Clare.” She went back to Jimmy and they walked away down the street.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“There was no sense to life, to the structure of things. D. H. Lawrence had known that.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“I went from barrel to barrel. It was magic. Why hadn’t someone told me? With this, life was great, a man was perfect, nothing could touch him.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“İlgi duymuyordum.Hiçbir şeye ilgi duymuyordum.
Nasıl kaçabileceğime dair hiç fikrim yoktu.
Diğerleri yaşamdan tat alıyorlardı hiç olmazsa.
Benim anlamadığım bir şeyi anlamışlardı sanki.Bende bir eksiklik vardı belki de.Mümkündü.Sık sık aşağılık duygusuna kapılırdım.Onlardan uzak olmak istiyordum.
Gidecek yerim yoktu ama.İntihar ?Tanrım,çaba gerektiriyordu.
Beş yıl uyumak istiyordum ama izin vermezlerdi.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“Curtis was just a chip off old Franky only she had much better legs. Poor Franky didn’t have any legs but he had a wonderful brain. In some other country he would have made”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“La primera cosa que recuerdo es estar debajo de algo. Era una mesa, veía la pata de una mesa, veía las piernas de la gente, y una parte del mantel colgando. Estaba oscuro allí debajo, me gustaba estar ahí. Debió de haber sido en Alemania, yo debía de tener entre uno y dos años de edad. Era en 1922. Me sentía bien bajo la mesa. Nadie parecía darse cuenta de que yo estaba allí. La luz del sol se reflejaba en la alfombra y en las piernas de la gente. Me gustaba la luz del sol. Las piernas de la gente no eran interesantes, no eran como el trozo de mantel que colgaba, ni como la pata de la mesa, ni como la luz del sol.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“I could see the road ahead of me. I was poor and I was going to stay poor. But I didn't particularly want money. I didn't know what I wanted. Yes, I did. I wanted someplace to hide out, someplace where one didn't have to do anything. The thought of being something didn't only appall me, it sickened me. The thought of being a lawyer or a councilman or an engineer, anything like that, seemed impossible to me. To get married, to have children, to get trapped in the family structure. To go someplace to work every day and to return. It was impossible. To do things, simple things, to be part of family picnics, Christmas, the 4th of July, Labor, Mother's Day . . . was a man born just to endure those things and then die? I would rather be a dishwasher, return alone to a tiny room and drink myself to sleep.

My father had a master plan. He told me, "My son, each man during his lifetime should buy a house. Finally he dies and leaves that house to his son. Then his son gets his own house and dies, leaves both houses to his son. That's two houses. That son gets his own house, that's three houses . . ."

The family structure. Victory over adversity through the family. He believed in it. Take the family, mix with God and Country, add the ten-hour day and you had what was needed.

I looked at my father, at his hands, his face, his eyebrows, and I knew that this man had nothing to do with me. He was a stranger. My mother was non-existent. I was cursed. Looking at my father I saw nothing but indecent dullness. Worse, he was even more afraid to fail than most others. Centuries of peasant blood and peasant training. The Chinaski bloodline had been thinned by a series of peasant-servants who had surrendered their real lives for fractional and illusionary gains. Not a man in line who said, "I don't want a house, I want a thousand houses, now!"

He had sent me to that rich high school hoping that the ruler's attitude would rub off on me as I watched the rich boys screech up in their cream-colored coupes and pick up the girls in bright dresses. Instead I learned that the poor usually stay poor. That the young rich smell the stink of the poor and learn to find it a bit amusing. They had to laugh, otherwise it would be too terrifying. They'd learned that, through the centuries. I would never forgive the girls for getting into those cream-colored coupes with the laughing boys. They couldn't help it, of course, yet you always think, maybe . . . But no, there weren't any maybes. Wealth meant victory and victory was the only reality.

What woman chooses to live with a dishwasher?”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham On Rye

“Suicide? Jesus Christ, just more work. I felt like sleeping for five years but they wouldn’t let me.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“There wasn't even resignation on my part, only disgust, a disgust that this had happened to me, and a disgust with the doctors who couldn't do anything about it. They were helpless and I was helpless, the only difference being that I was the victim.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“I never hit another home run. I struck out most of the time. But they always remembered that home run and while they still hated me, it was a better kind of hatred, like they weren't quite sure why.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“You needed love, but not the kind of love most people used and were used up by.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“He was bursting with enthusiasms. He probably loved many things: the hawk in flight, the god-damned ocean, full moon, Balzac, bridges, stage plays, the Pulitzer Prize, the piano, the god-damned Bible.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“Ben zengin çocukların patinaj çekerek parlak renkli elbiseler giymiş kızları götürmelerini izlerken, o beni onların elit havası belki bana da bulaşır düşüncesiyle yollamıştı o liseye. Yoksulların genellikle yoksul kaldıklarını öğrenmiştim oysa. Zenginlerin yoksullardan gelen pis kokuyu aldıklarını, bunu biraz da eğlendirici bulmayı öğrendiklerini. Gülmek zorundaydılar, çok korkunç olurdu yoksa. Bu şekilde davranmayı öğrenmişlerdi. Asırların deneyimine sahiptiler.
Kahkahalar atan çocukların parlak arabalarına bindikleri için asla affetmeyeceğim o kızları. Ellerinde değildi tabii ki, ama yine de belki diye düşünüyor insan... Ama hayır, belkiler filan yoktu. Varlıklı olmak zafer demekti ve zafer tek gerçekti.
Hangi kadın bir bulaşıkçıyla yaşamayı seçer?

Lise yaşantım boyunca ilerde ne olacağımı düşünmemeye çalıştım. Bu düşünceleri geciktirmek daha cazipti.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“Who was Col. Sussex? Just some guy who had to shit like the rest of us.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“The...”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“Você tem de morrer algumas vezes antes que você possa realmente viver.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“Turguenev era um homem muito sério mas fazia-me rir porque a verdade quando é encontrada pela primeira vez pode ser divertida. Quando a verdade de alguém é semelhante à tua verdade, e parece que está apenas a dizê-la a ti, é fantástico.”
― Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye