Better to work for yourself alone. You do as you like and follow your own ideas, you admire yourself and please yourself: isn’t that the main thing? And then the public is so stupid. Besides, who reads? And what do they read? And what do they admire?

Anything becomes interesting if you look at it long enough.

There are three thing in the world I love most: the sea, Hamlet, and Don Giovanni.

Style is as much under the words as in the words. It is as much the soul as it is the flesh of a work.

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

The finest works of art are those in which there is the least matter. The closer expression comes to thought, the more the word clings to the idea and disappears, the more beautiful the work of art.

You don't know what it is to stay a whole day with your head in your hands trying to squeeze your unfortunate brain so as to find a word.