bare existence

Nash wrote for bare existence—to use his own words, ‘contending with the cold, and conversing with scarcity.’

You and bare existence—the two things I saved from the wreck.

For a time it was a struggle for bare existence, and the little colony was brought very near to extinction.

But meanwhile the once proud kingdom of Assyria had been contending for bare existence.

I ask of life no more than a bare existence and that, a thousand times that, is mine, by the benevolence of Mr. Early.