"Women: I liked the colors of their clothing; the way they walked; the cruelty in some faces; now and then the almost pure beauty in another face, totally and enchantingly female. They had it over us: they planned much better and were better organized. While men were watching professional football or drinking beer or bowling, they, the women, were thinking about us, concentrating, studying, deciding - whether to accept us, discard us, exchange us, kill us or whether simply to leave us. In the end it hardly mattered; no matter what they did, we ended up lonely and insane"
About this Quote
The real engine here is wounded male paranoia dressed up as sociology. Men are infantilized into distractions (football, beer, bowling), while women get cast as strategists with frightening administrative competence. It's funny in a bleak way because it's exaggerated to the edge of conspiracy: women "exchange us, kill us", a lineup of options that reads like a dating app menu narrated by a man who can't stop catastrophizing. Bukowski's macho persona needs women to be powerful, even punitive, because that makes his own failures feel less like personal responsibility and more like fate.
The kicker is the final turn: "it hardly mattered". After all the posturing about female control, he lands on a confession of existential damage: loneliness and insanity as the default male condition. In Bukowski's orbit - postwar America, factory work, cheap rooms, alcohol, a culture selling masculinity as competence - this is less a verdict on women than an autopsy of men who never learned emotional literacy, so they mythologize the people who can still hurt them.
Quote Details
| Topic | Loneliness |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Bukowski, Charles. (2026, February 10). Women: I liked the colors of their clothing; the way they walked; the cruelty in some faces; now and then the almost pure beauty in another face, totally and enchantingly female. They had it over us: they planned much better and were better organized. While men were watching professional football or drinking beer or bowling, they, the women, were thinking about us, concentrating, studying, deciding - whether to accept us, discard us, exchange us, kill us or whether simply to leave us. In the end it hardly mattered; no matter what they did, we ended up lonely and insane. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/women-i-liked-the-colors-of-their-clothing-the-185209/
Chicago Style
Bukowski, Charles. "Women: I liked the colors of their clothing; the way they walked; the cruelty in some faces; now and then the almost pure beauty in another face, totally and enchantingly female. They had it over us: they planned much better and were better organized. While men were watching professional football or drinking beer or bowling, they, the women, were thinking about us, concentrating, studying, deciding - whether to accept us, discard us, exchange us, kill us or whether simply to leave us. In the end it hardly mattered; no matter what they did, we ended up lonely and insane." FixQuotes. February 10, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/women-i-liked-the-colors-of-their-clothing-the-185209/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Women: I liked the colors of their clothing; the way they walked; the cruelty in some faces; now and then the almost pure beauty in another face, totally and enchantingly female. They had it over us: they planned much better and were better organized. While men were watching professional football or drinking beer or bowling, they, the women, were thinking about us, concentrating, studying, deciding - whether to accept us, discard us, exchange us, kill us or whether simply to leave us. In the end it hardly mattered; no matter what they did, we ended up lonely and insane." FixQuotes, 10 Feb. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/women-i-liked-the-colors-of-their-clothing-the-185209/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.
