Every true writer is like a bird; he repeats the same song, the same theme, all his life. For me, this theme as always been revolt.

I don't think it's possible to write a good novel around a negative personality.

Good writers are monotonous, like good composers. They keep trying to perfect the one problem they were born to understand.

The novel as we knew it in the nineteenth century was killed off by Proust and Joyce.

The less one notices happiness, the greater it is.

This thought strengthened in me my belief that all men, without exception, deserve to be pitied, if only because they are alive.

A writer survives in spite of his beliefs.