The truth is that every intelligent man, as you know, dreams of being a gangster and of ruling over society by force alone. As it is not so easy as the detective novels might lead one to believe, one generally relies on politics and joins the cruelest party.What does it matter, after all, if by humiliating one's mind one succeeds in dominating every one? I discovered in myself sweet dreams of oppression.

The important thing isn't the soundness or otherwise of the argument, but for it to make you think.

Every man needs slaves like he needs clean air. To rule is to breathe, is it not? And even the most disenfranchised get to breathe. The lowest on the social scale have their spouses or their children.

You have to be very rich or very poor to live without a trade.

There is nothing abstract about pain. It is specific, it is real, and, when it is intense, it is world destroying.

I am not made for politics because I am incapable of wanting or accepting the death of the adversary.

If it adapts itself to what the majority of our society wants, art will be a meaningless recreation.