In displaying the psychology of your characters, minute particulars are essential. God save us from vague generalizations!

When performing an autopsy, even the most inveterate spiritualist would have to question where the soul is.

In descriptions of nature one must seize on small details, grouping them so that when the reader closes his eyes he gets a picture.

If you want to work on your art, work on your life.

My mother and father are the only people on the whole planet for whom I will never begrudge a thing. Should I achieve great things, it is the work of their hands; they are splendid people and their absolute love of their children places them above the highest praise. It cloaks all of their shortcomings, shortcomings that may have resulted from a difficult life.

You don't understand, you fool' says Yegor, looking dreamily up at the sky. 'You've never understood what kind of person I am, nor will you in a million years... You just think I'm a mad person who has thrown his life away... Once the free spirit has taken hold of a man, there's no way of getting it out of him.

Life does not agree with philosophy: There is no happiness that is not idleness, and only what is useless is pleasurable.