We know perfectly well that neither love nor peace of mind can be bought with any currency.

Art is realistic when it strives to express an ethical ideal. Realism is striving for truth, and truth is always beautiful. Here the aesthetic coincides with the ethical.

Knowledge is truthful only if it’s based in morality.

I have to say from the outset that not all prose can be transferred to the screen.

I think a person needs to learn from childhood to find himself alone. It means to not be bored when you’re by yourself, because a person who finds himself bored when alone –as it seems to me– is in danger.

The allotted function of art is not, as is often assumed, to put across ideas, to propagate thoughts, to serve as an example. The aim of art is to prepare a person for death, to plough and harrow his soul, rendering it capable of turning to good.

It is obvious that art cannot teach anyone anything, since in four thousand years humanity has learnt nothing at all.