The poor don't know that their function in life is to exercise our generosity.

I do not understand! I understand nothing! I cannot understand nor do I want to understand! I want to believe! To Believe!

Genius is what a man invents when he is looking for a way out.

So it comes to this; one doesn’t need rest. Why bother about sleep if one isn’t sleepy? That stands to reason, doesn’t it? Wait a minute, there’s a snag somewhere; something disagreeable. Why, now, should it be disagreeable? …Ah, I see; it’s life without a break.

I think [Alain Robbe-Grillet] a good writer, but he speaks to the comfortable bourgeoisie.

Then I realized what separated us: what I thought about him could not reach him; it was psychology, the kind they write about in books. But his judgment went through me like a sword and questioned my very right to exist. And it was true, I had always realized it; I hadn't the right to exist. I had appeared by chance, I existed like a stone, a plant or a microbe. My life put out feelers towards small pleasures in every direction. Sometimes it sent out vague signals; at other times I felt nothing more than a harmless buzzing.

Good digestions, the gray monotony of provincial life, and the boredom-ah the soul-destroying boredom-of long days of mild content.