There's something perverse about women...they're all masochists at heart.

You are the only woman who has a sense of gaiety, a wise tolerance - no more, you seem to urge me to betray you. I love you for that. [...] I don't know what to expect of you, but it is something in the way of a miracle. I am going to demand everything of you - even the impossible, because you encourage it. You are really strong. I even like your deceit, your treachery. It seems aristocratic to me.

The real enemy can always be met and conquered, or won over. Real antagonism is based on love, a love which has not recognized itself.

The art of living is based on rhythm - on give & take, ebb & flow, light & dark, life & death. By acceptance of all aspects of life, good & bad, right & wrong, yours & mine, the static, defensive life, which is what most people are cursed with, is converted into a dance, 'the dance of life,' metamorphosis.

I demanded a realm in which I should be both master and slave at the same time: The world of art is the only such realm.

Music is a beautiful opiate, if you don't take it too seriously.

Life has to be given a meaning because of the obvious fact that it has no meaning.