Ambition is a drug that makes its addicts potential madmen.

I feel completely detached from any country, any group. I am a metaphysically displaced person

To read is to let someone else work for you - the most delicate form of exploitation.

In order to have the stuff of a tyrant, a certain mental derangement is necessary.

The only way of enduring one disaster after the next is to love the very idea of disaster: if we succeed, there are no further surprises, we are superior to whatever occurs, we are invincible victims.

The source of our actions resides in an unconscious propensity to regard ourselves as the center, the cause, and the conclusion of time. Our reflexes and our pride transform into a planet the parcel of flesh and consciousness we are.

Were we to undertake an exhaustive self-scrutiny, disgust would paralyze us, we would be doomed to a thankless existence.