In my photographs it is apparent that there was no posing at the moment I released the shutter.

[Nabokov's] language is made visible . . . like a veil or transparent curtain. You cannot help seeing the curtain as you peek into the intimate rooms behind.

I am inspired by human sexuality. The act itself is mechanical and holds little interest to me.

It is possible to stand around with a cocktail in one's hand and talk with everyone, which means with no one.

She seemed to belong to that pagan, primitive kingdom of birds and forests where everything was infinitely abundant, wild, blooming, and royal in its perpetual decay, death, and rebirth; illicit and clashing with the human world.

I write for a certain sphere of readers in the United States who on average watch seven and a half hours of multichannel television per day.

There must be no worse punishment to a totalitarian nation than the withdrawal of capital.