Death is the great Maecenas, Death is the great angel of writing. You must write because you are not going to live any more.

I live through risk. Without risk there is no art. You should always be on the edge of a cliff about to fall down and break your neck.

I’ve been thrashed by the critics. I love having critics for breakfast. I’ve been having them for 30 years in Mexico - just eating them like chicken and then throwing the bones away. They have not survived, I have!

I don't think any good book is based on factual experience. Bad books are about things the writer already knew before he wrote them.

By its very nature, the novel indicates that we are becoming. There is no final solution. There is no last word.

Memory is satisfied desire.

Now the masses of Latin America are electing governments they feel can take forward the democratic reforms of the last 20 years, and transform them into social and economic reforms. This is, I think, extremely important, because it also means that the left has abandoned the revolutionary solution proposed by Che Guevara and has taken the democratic path.