Literature is a defense against the attacks of life. It says to life: You can't deceive me. I know your habits, foresee and enjoy watching all your reactions, and steal your secret by involving you in cunning obstructions that halt your normal flow.

If you wish to travel far and fast, travel light. Take off all your envies, jealousies, unforgiveness, selfishness and fears.

Verrà la morte e avrà i tuoi occhi. (Death will come and it will have your eyes.)

The closing years of life are like the end of a masquerade party, when the masks are dropped.

We can all do good deeds, but very few of us can think good thoughts.

At great periods you have always felt, deep within you, the temptation to commit suicide. You gave yourself to it, breached your own defenses. You were a child. The idea of suicide was a protest against life; by dying, you would escape this longing for death.

One stops being a child when one realizes that telling one's trouble does not make it any better.