I'm an egotist, but I'm not selfish. There's a difference. I'm a neurotic, I guess. I can't stop thinking about myself. It isn't that I think myself so important. I simply can't think about anything else, that's all.

Even if one’s whole life were a mistake, there is always time to change.

What holds the world together, as I have learned from bitter experience, is sexual intercourse.

Voyages are accomplished inwardly.

Once you have given up the ghost, everything follows with dead certainty, even in the midst of chaos.

That we cannot rise equal to situations when we are in them — that is the tragedy of life.

When you meet the man [Brassai] you see at once that he is equipped with no ordinary eyes. And the sharpness of vision and depth of insight are revealed in Brassai's lifelong photographic exploration of Paris - its people, places, and things.