In a country lacking leaders, in Africa, for instance, how could a native educated in Europe refuse to become a professor, even at the price of his literary vocation?

Man can will nothing unless he has first understood that he must count on no one but himself; that he is alone, abandoned on earth in the midst of his infinite responsibilities, without help, with no other aim than the one he sets himself, with no other destiny than the one he forges for himself on this earth.

Like all dreamers, I mistook disenchantment for truth.

It's quite an undertaking to start loving somebody. You have to have energy, generosity, blindness. There is even a moment right at the start where you have to jump across an abyss: if you think about it you don't do it.

I think of death only with tranquility, as an end. I refuse to let death hamper life. Death must enter life only to define it.

I should wish [Alain Robbe-Grillet] to realize that Guinea exists.

In Les Mots I explain the origin of my madness, of my neurosis. This analysis may help the young who dream of writing.