One does not go to the theater to see life and nature; one goes to see the particular way in which life and nature happen to look to a cultivated, imaginative and entertaining man who happens, in turn, to be a playwright.

I drink to make other people interesting.

Politics is the diversion of trivial men who, when they succeed at it, become important in the eyes of more trivial men.

Common sense, in so far as it exists, is all for the bourgeoisie. Nonsense is the privilege of the aristocracy. The worries of the world are for the common people.

An optimist is a fellow who believes a housefly is looking for a way to get out.

The Russian dramatist is one who, walking through a cemetery, does not see the flowers on the graves. The American dramatist . . . Does not see the graves under the flowers.

It is also said of me that I now and then contradict myself. Yes, I improve wonderfully as time goes on.