Like the dung beetle, I had my comfortable burrow and my…

“They needed someone to hate, a tangible focus for their remorse and disappointment, and I’d been elected, the projection of their own inner hell.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“I’m living the life of an urban hunter-gatherer—again.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“I’m back at Lafayette Park after a trip to the Bodhi Tree Bookstore, not to look at the books but to rub up against…

— Donald O'Donovan

“Your lifelong rebellion against all forms of authority stems from the infant’s desire to murder the father and possess the mother.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“Nowhere do you see a real, integrated, full-blooded man or woman who shines like a beacon in this sea of disjointedness.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“Los Angeles is a mother that devours her children.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“I was born under that star, the dung-beetle star.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“Los Angeles, this anthill, this slag heap, the city where I suffered and grappled with life and was defeated, and where I finally triumphed.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“The enemy never sleeps!”

— Donald O'Donovan

“I love LA! The freeways, the cars, the smog, the glitter, the glitz, the sleaze, the prostitutes, the poison that falls from the sky.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“Compassion goes out looking for suffering, scouring the earth for poverty and misery and pain, the same way the cops look for criminals.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“My grandfather was a railroad brakeman, sixty years with the D&H. I'd sit on his lap when I was little, I remember, at the…

— Donald O'Donovan

“Meditation doesn’t lead to enlightenment because in meditation the ego is trying to destroy the ego.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“And when Prohibition came along, Dr. Sharpe’s Shakti Tonic took off like a rocket, mostly due to its hefty eighteen percent alcohol content.”

— Donald O'Donovan

“Having a job is like having a lobotomy.”

— Donald O'Donovan