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Who really said it

Find what you love and let it kill you

Not Charles Bukowski — actually Kinky Friedman Kinky Friedman 1944–2024 · American singer-songwriter, humorist & novelist
Disputed Rights unconfirmed

Bukowski is the internet’s favorite host for this line, but no poem, story, or letter of his contains it. Quote Investigator traces the adage to Texas humorist Kinky Friedman, quoted in a 1986 Houston Chronicle profile saying “find what you like, and let it kill you.” The now-famous “love” wording came later, from his friend Van Dyke Parks misremembering the line in a 1998 interview.

Last verified 14 Jul 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

For presentations

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Disputed credit — copy with the correction

“Find what you love and let it kill you” Not Charles Bukowski. The adage traces to humorist Kinky Friedman, quoted in the Houston Chronicle (Sept. 18, 1986) as "find what you like, and let it kill you." The "love" wording came from Van Dyke Parks in a 1998 interview. Origin documented by Quote Investigator.

The slide-ready mistake: crediting this to Charles Bukowski. Use the credit shown above instead.

Can you use it?

We couldn’t verify where this wording comes from, so there’s no rights status to give. Safe to present as an unverified or anonymous line — just don’t assert a specific author or source.

Image direction — grounded in this quote’s real context; paste into your image tool

In context

Evoking the world of Kinky Friedman — American singer-songwriter, humorist & mystery novelist. Theme: "Find what you love and let it kill you". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Minimalist

Minimalist editorial slide for the quote "Find what you love and let it kill you". Clean background, a single muted accent color, generous negative space, subtle paper or linen texture, no literal illustration — let the words carry it. Reserve clear space for a serif quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Provenance

Where the line actually comes from

Coined by
Kinky Friedman (as “find what you like…”)
Earliest record
“‘Just another side of me’ – Friedman swaps music for mystery,” Houston Chronicle, Sept. 18, 1986
“Love” variant
Van Dyke Parks, CMJ New Music Monthly interview, April 1998
Bukowski credit
First seen online April 2012; fabricated “letter” by December 2012

“I’ve always said: Find what you like, and let it kill you.”

Kinky Friedman’s original phrasing as documented in the 1986 Houston Chronicle profile. The widely shared “find what you love” version is Van Dyke Parks’ 1998 rewording, not Bukowski’s.

Quote Investigator: the full origin trail

How we verified this

  • The line is universally pinned to Charles Bukowski, but Quote Investigator found no poem, story, or letter of his that contains it.
  • The earliest evidence is a Sept. 18, 1986 Houston Chronicle profile in which humorist Kinky Friedman says “find what you like, and let it kill you.” His publicist later confirmed to the Houston Press that “Kinky has assured me it is a pure Kinky-ism.”
  • The “love” wording entered circulation when Friedman’s friend Van Dyke Parks paraphrased the line in a 1998 CMJ New Music Monthly interview, per Quote Investigator.
  • The Bukowski attribution appeared only in 2012 — eighteen years after his death — and hardened into a fabricated “letter” signed, tellingly, “~ Falsely yours,” as documented by QI.

The exact wording is a short spoken aphorism, not a line from any identifiable copyrighted Bukowski work — the Bukowski attribution is false. Its documented origins are a 1986 newspaper profile of Kinky Friedman and a 1998 magazine interview; short aphorisms like this generally fall outside copyright protection, so no clear rights status is asserted.

Fact-check

How Bukowski got the credit

This is a textbook “magnet” misattribution: a punchy line drifts onto a famous edgy writer and sticks.

Charles Bukowski Misattributed

No poem, story, or letter by Bukowski contains this line. The credit first appeared online around April 21, 2012 — eighteen years after his 1994 death — and by December 2012 was wrapped in a fabricated “letter” signed “~ Falsely yours,” per Quote Investigator.

Van Dyke Parks (rewording, not origination) Reworded

The catchy “find what you love” phrasing wasn’t Friedman’s original — his friend Van Dyke Parks introduced “love” while paraphrasing him in a 1998 CMJ New Music Monthly interview. Friedman’s own words used “like.”

The adage is Kinky Friedman’s — “find what you like, and let it kill you” (1986) — not Bukowski’s, as Quote Investigator and the Houston Press both established.

Context

Why the mix-up makes sense

Bukowski — the poet of drink, ruin, and doomed devotion — is exactly the persona this line seems to belong to, which is precisely why it stuck to him. The sentiment fits his myth so snugly that few readers ever pause to ask for a page number.

But the trail runs to a different kind of Texan wit. Kinky Friedman delivered it as a wisecrack about betting his life on the things he loved; the more romantic “love” version is a friend’s fond misquotation that outgrew the original.

“Kinky has assured me it is a pure Kinky-ism.”

Explore

Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

Purpose Work

Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Quote Investigator: Find What You Love, and Let It Kill Youquoteinvestigator.com

The authoritative origin trail: Kinky Friedman (1986), Van Dyke Parks’ 1998 rewording, and the debunked Bukowski attribution.
Did Charles Bukowski Really Say…?houstonpress.com

Houston Press fact-check; Friedman’s publicist confirms the line is “a pure Kinky-ism.”
Kinky Friedmanen.wikipedia.org

Biography of the Texas singer-songwriter, humorist and novelist who coined the adage (1944–2024).
Charles Bukowski (Wikiquote)en.wikiquote.org

Wikiquote’s Bukowski page for cross-checking what he actually wrote.
“Find what you love and let it kill you” threadbukowskiforum.com

Bukowski fans’ own search for a source — including an unclaimed cash-and-book bounty for proof it exists.

The real author

Who actually coined it

Kinky Friedman

1944–2024 · American singer-songwriter, humorist & mystery novelist

Richard Samet “Kinky” Friedman was a Texas satirist who fronted the band Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys before turning to comic detective novels and a Texas Monthly column. He ran an eccentric independent campaign for Texas governor in 2006. The aphorism “find what you like, and let it kill you” was, by his own account, a pure Kinky-ism — later softened into “love” and mistakenly handed to Bukowski.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Primary & investigative sources

Kinky Friedman, quoted in “‘Just another side of me’ – Friedman swaps music for mystery” (Michael Spies), Houston Chronicle, September 18, 1986 (as “find what you like, and let it kill you”); the “love” variant from Van Dyke Parks, CMJ New Music Monthly, April 1998. Origin traced by Quote Investigator, May 29, 2014.

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘Find what you love and let it kill you’?” Last verified 14 Jul 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/find-what-you-love-and-let-it-kill-you

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