Charles Bukowski Says You’re A Fly Hanging Around Sniffing A Turd
If you’re guilty of doing this terrible atrocity as a writer
I’ll get straight to the point. Day two of five of analyzing quotes from Charles Bukowski on writing and, yes, it relates to flies, turds … maybe you.
Thanks for not getting freaked out by my headline. I just finished reading Kristina God’s article, “How to Harness The Power of Polarizing Content” before writing my title and thought I’d go with a slightly polarizing title.
Quick Bukowski Intro:
The poet/novelist gained a cult following as an Indie writer before he died in 1994. He writes with the economy of Ernest Hemingway, the aggressiveness of Hunter S. Thompson, and you never know what he might he might write from one sentence to the next and he can (occasionally) be crude at times.
The Quote
Here’s Bukowski’s quote on a habit you may need to break:
“The worst thing for a writer is to know another writer, and worse than that, to know a number of other writers. Like flies on the same turd.”
— Charles Bukowski, Post Office
You put a bunch of writers in a room or two writers get together for coffee, and you know what’s going to happen. They go on yapping about writing and not writing. That’s what Bukowski is saying with his fly-turd metaphor.
I knew a writer in my 20’s. He would stay in his office and write all week. I was his cab driver on Friday nights when he went to socialize at an Irish pub.
The pub was where he yapped. But he wrote from Monday to Friday. I’d say Bukowski and my writer-friend were adherents of Steve Pressfield’s blue-collar writing manifesto:
“I put my ass where my heart wants to be and plunge in.”
Is Bukowski Right?
Bukowski’s advises us to not to know other writers since it could lead us to sniffing turds with writers. It’s an interesting and evocative metaphor, but is it true? I’d say yes and no, and it all depends on every writer’s own experience.
If you’re talking with other writers or people is exceeding your time spent writing — and your writing is something you take serious — then it might be true you’re gathering too much with other writers and, well, sniffing a Big Joe.
(That used to be son’s favorite word for a poop from the movie Joe Dirt.)
But, if you’ve been around Medium a while, I’m sure you’ve experienced how nice it is to develop a friendship with other writers where you read and comment on each others writing and get to know each other through an app.
You’ve made an online friend that’s as good to me as a face-to-face friend.
It helps make you feel like you’re not all alone typing away in the bathroom, and there are crazy people out there who like writing on the same subjects as you or have some the same relationships experiences (KiKi Walter) in life.
There is a kinship you feel with other writers.
Like you’re part of The Creator Economy Tribe.
So I have to partially disagree with Bukowski on his fly-and-turd image. I think for me it’s all about finding the right balance between my writing, work, relationships and the other aspects of my life by giving each the proper focus.
Only you know what is the write balance between writing and your life. But I have noticed when it does start to feel like I’m talking more than writing.
And I will remember Bukowski’s fly-and-turd image when it happens.
Maybe, you will too.
Here are a few Bukowski recommendations:
Post Office (novel)
Notes of a Dirty Old Man (novel)
Last Night on Earth Poems
Done of my five-day series analyzing Charles Bukowski’s writing quotes, “Writing Advice From Charles Bukowski That May Kill You.”
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