Once a man gets a fixed idea, there's nothing to be done.

Love, friendship and respect do not unite people as much as common hatred for something.

It is time for writers to admit that nothing in this world makes sense. Only fools and charlatans think they know and understand everything. The stupider they are, the wider they conceive their horizons to be. And if an artist decides to declare that he understands nothing of what he sees - this in itself constitutes a considerable clarity in the realm of thought, and a great step forward.

It is not only the prisoners who grow coarse and hardened from corporal punishment, but those as well who perpetrate the act or are present to witness it.

When you want to touch the reader's heart, try to be colder. It gives their grief as it were, a background, against which it stands out in greater relief.

People don't notice whether it's winter or summer when they're happy.

If there is a gun hanging on the wall in the first act, it must fire in the last.