But women are always attracted to power. I do not think there could ever be a conqueror so bloody that most women would not willingly lie with him in the hope of bearing a son who would be every bit as ferocious as the father.

A superficial education would be worse than none. But a full education would open every man's eyes to the nature of human existence.

I am a born novelist, which does not happen all that often. There are people who try to write for a certain time, then they become Ministers of Culture under de Gaulle, and they begin living their own fictions.

The American vice is explanation.

The more money an American accumulates, the less interesting he becomes.

I write in different styles because I hear different voices in my head. It would be boring to have always the same voice, point of view.

Democracy is something America has never really practiced. Because the Founding Fathers hated two things: monarchy and democracy. They wanted a republic, a replica of the Roman or Venetian republics. They didn't even like the etymology of the word "democracy."