Have you no hope at all? And do you really live with the thought that when you die, you die, and nothing remains?" "Yes," I said.

A novel is never anything but a philosophy expressed in images. And in a good novel the philosophy has disappeared into the images.

At the heart of all beauty lies something inhuman.

You know, [women] do not really condemn any weakness: rather, they try to humiliate or disarm our strengths. That is why women arethe reward, not of the warrior, but of the criminal.

Integrity needs no rules.

No doubt our love was still there, but quite simply it was unusable, heavy to carry, inert inside of us, sterile as crime or condemnation. It was no longer anything except a patience with no future and a stubborn wait.

he's incapable of suffering for a long time, or being happy for a long time. Which means that he's incapable of anything really worth while.