The only way to avoid being unhappy is to close yourself up in Art and to count for nothing all the rest.

By dint of railing at idiots, one runs the risk of becoming an idiot oneself.

And indeed, what is better than to sit by one's fireside in the evening with a book, while the wind beats against the window and the lamp is buring?

Talent is long patience.

I’m dazzled by your facility. In ten days you’ll have written six stories! I don’t understand it… I’m like one of those old aqueducts: there’s so much rubbish cogging up the banks of my thought that it flows slowly, and only spills from the end of my pen drop by drop.

Years passed; and he endured the idleness of his intelligence and the inertia of his heart.

All you have to do to make something interesting is to look at it long enough.