To copy the truth can be a good thing, but to invent the truth is better, much better.

The artist must yield himself to his own inspiraton, and if he has a true talent, no one knows and feels better than he what suits him.

The success of our operas rests most of the time in the hands of the conductor. This person is as necessary as a tenor or a prima donna.

Our mistake, you see, was to write interminable large operas, which had to fill an entire evening. And now along comes someone with a one or two-act opera without all that pompous nonsense - that was a happy reform.

Through care taken over trends, the desire to be novel and affectation knowledge, we repudiate our art, our instinct, our own way of doing things; it is absurd and stupid

I order that my funeral ceremonies be extremely modest, and that they take place at dawn or at the evening Ave Maria, without song or music.

I have striven for perfection, it has always eluded me, but I surely had an obligation to make one more try.