The Frenchman is first and foremost a man. He is likeable often just because of his weaknesses, which are always thoroughly human, even if despicable.

America is no place for an artist: to be an artist is to be a moral leper, an economic misfit, a social liability. A corn-fed hog enjoys a better life than a creative writer, painter or musician. To be a rabbit is better still.

There is something else to be said about this immediate, spontaneous way of working, and that is this: in such moments, one is playing at the game of creation.

The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.

An artist earns the right to call himself a creator only when he admits to himself that he is but an instrument.

To have her here in bed with me, breathing on me, her hair in my mouth—I count that something of a miracle.

You can travel fifty thousand miles in America without once tasting a piece of good bread.