To have committed every crime but that of being a father.

A sudden silence in the middle of a conversation suddenly brings us back to essentials: it reveals how dearly we must pay for the invention of speech.

We interest others by the misfortune we spread around us.

A book has to dig through the wounds, more, it has cause a new one, a book it has to be dangerous.

Humanity adores only those who cause it to perish.

Just as ecstasy purifies you of the particular and the contingent, leaving nothing except light and darkness, so insomnia kills off the multiplicity and diversity of the world, leaving you prey to your private obsessions.

A distant enemy is always preferable to one at the gate.