The public, too, has to make an effort in order to understand the writer who, though he renounce complacent obscurity, cannot always express his new-hidden thoughts lucidly and according to accepted models.

Little flashes of sun on the surface of a cold, dark sea.

A writer must refuse to allow himself to be transformed into an institution, even if it takes place in the most honorable form.

No finite point has meaning without an infinite reference point.

What do you want to do with the [Communist] Party? A racing stable? What good is it to sharpen a knife every day if you never useit for slicing? A party is never more than a means. There is only one objective: power.

I'm going to smile, and my smile will sink down into your pupils, and heaven knows what it will become.

The real nature of the present revealed itself: it was what exists, all that was not present did not exist.