I like to compare my method with that of painters centuries ago, proceeding from layer to layer.

You can't think on purpose about somebody or something. Either you think about them naturally or you don't think at all.

When I sit at my table to write, I never know what it's going to be until I'm under way. I trust in inspiration, which sometimes comes and sometimes doesn't. But I don't sit back waiting for it. I work every day.

When you aren't sincere you need to pretend, and by pretending you end up believing yourself; that's the basic principle of every faith.

The less one notices happiness, the greater it is.

War has become an affair of machines...and soldiers are little more than clever mechanics.

I do not foresee a time when I shall feel that I have nothing to say.