Cultivate your Futurism. I'll cultivate my Döblinism.

The cities are the principal home and seat of the human group. They are the coral colony for Man, the collective being.

I read like the flame reads the wood.

Much unhappiness comes from walking alone. When there are several, it's somewhat different. I must get into the habit of listening to others, for what the others say concerns me, too.

The subject of the novel is reality liberated from soul. The reader in complete independence presented with a structured process:let him evaluate it, not the author. The façade of the novel cannot be other than stone or steel, flashing electrically or dark, but silent.

In the course of writing one historical book or another, it has happened that I could hardly restrain myself from simply copying entire documents. Indeed, I sometimes sank down among the documents and said to myself, I can't improve on these.

No country is so peaceful as the one that leads into death. Life arches above one's head like a bridgespan, and below it flows the water, carries the boat, takes it further.