The more transparent the writing, the more visible the poetry.

He soon acquired the forlorn look that one sees in vegetarians.

I have never done anything except write, but I don't possess the vocation or talents of a narrator, have no knowledge at all of the laws of dramatic composition, and if I have embarked upon this enterprise it is because I trust in the light shed by how much I have read in my life.

For you was I born, for you do I have life, for you will I die, for you am I now dying.

A lie is more comfortable than doubt, more useful than love, more lasting than truth.

It is a triumph of life that old people lose their memories of inessential things.

Necessity has the face of a dog.