Criticism is a misconception: we must read not to understand others but to understand ourselves.

When people come to me saying they want to kill themselves, I tell them, "What’s your rush? You can kill yourself any time you like. So calm down. Suicide is a positive act." And they do calm down.

The only free mind is one that, pure of all intimacy with beings or objects, plies its own vacuity.

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

Anyone can escape into sleep, we are all geniuses when we dream, the butcher's the poet's equal there.

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

To venture upon an undertaking of any kind, even the most insignificant, is to sacrifice to envy.