What I regretted in La Nausee was not to have put myself completely into the thing. I remained outside my hero's disease, protected by my neurosis which, through writing, gave me happiness.

I enjoy feeling fastidious and aloof. I enjoy saying no, always no, and I should be afraid of any attempt to construct a finally habitable world, because I should merely have to say - Yes; and act like other people.

Don't you feel the same way? When I cannot see myself, even though I touch myself, I wonder if I really exist.

Once we know and are aware, we are responsible for our action and our inaction. We can do something about it or ignore it. Either way, we are still responsible.

If literature isn't everything, it's not worth a single hour of someone's trouble.

I must be without remorse or regrets as I am without excuse; for from the instant of my upsurge into being, I carry the weight of the world by myself alone without help, engaged in a world for which I bear the whole responsibility without being able, whatever I do, to tear myself away from this responsibility for an instant.

I found the human heart empty and insipid everywhere except in books.