Whatever I do is done out of sheer joy; I drop my fruits like a ripe tree. What the general reader or the critic makes of them is not my concern.

Who but the artist has the power to open man up, to set free the imagination? The others - priest, teacher, saint, statesman, warrior - hold us to the path of history. They keep us chained to the rock, that the vultures may eat out our hearts. It is the artist who has the courage to go against the crowd; he is the unrecognized "hero of our time" - and of all time.

I believe in saying the truth, coming out with it cold, shocking if necessary, not disguising it.

The blind lead the blind. It's the democratic way.

The smile was so painfully swift and fleeting that it was like the flash of a knife.

I want to undress you, vulgarize you a bit.

There are moments when the elixir of life rises to such over−brimming splendor that the soul spills over. In the seraphic smile of the Madonnas the soul is seen to flood the psyche. The moon of the face becomes full; the equation is perfect. A minute, a half−minute, a second later, the miracle has passed. Something intangible , something inexplicable, was given out-and received.