Love, she thought, must come suddenly, with great outbursts and lightnings,--a hurricane of the skies, which falls upon life, revolutionises it, roots up the will like a leaf, and sweeps the whole heart into the abyss.

She was the amoureuse of all the novels, the heroine of all the plays, the vague “she” of all the poetry books.

A man is a critic when he cannot be an artist, in the same way that a man becomes an informer when he cannot be a soldier.

A memory is a beautiful thing, it's almost a desire that you miss.

Nothing is more humiliating than to see idiots succeed in enterprises we have failed in.

I detest my fellow-beings and do not feel that I am their fellow at all

Reality does not conform to the ideal, but confirms it.