A long time ago I decided that my universe will be the soul and heart of man.

Yesterday's concert was a success. I hasten to let you know. I inform your Lordship that I was not a bit nervous and played as I play when I am alone. It went well... and I had to come back and bow four times.

The Official Bulletin declared that the Poles should be as proud of me as the Germans are of Mozart; obvious nonsense.

It's a huge Carthusian monastery, stuck down between rocks and sea, where you may imagine me, without white gloves or hair curling, as pale as ever, in a cell with such doors as Paris never had for gates. The cell is the shape of a tall coffin, with an enormous dusty vaulting, a small window... Bach, my scrawls and waste paper - silence - you could scream - there would still be silence. Indeed, I write to you from a strange place.

Play Mozart in memory of me - and I will hear you.

I wish I could throw off the thoughts which poison my happiness, but I take a kind of pleasure in indulging them.

I don't know where there can be so many pianists as in Paris, so many asses and so many virtuosi.