Looking for pleasure is the best way to ensure you won't find it.

It amused me to think that one can tell the truth when one is drunk and nobody will believe it.

To jealousy, nothing is more frightful than laughter.

The one thing I regret is that I will never have time to read all the books I want to read.

I was thinking that I should be content to kiss him until the break of day. Bertrand ran out of kisses too soon; desire made them superfluous in his eyes. They were only a stage on the road to pleasure, not something inexhaustible and self-sufficient, as Luc had revealed them to me.

There are moments when you feel trapped, ill at ease. A year later the same feeling can turn out to be the theme of a book.

I shall live badly if I do not write, and I shall write badly if I do not live.