Words have their own hierarchy, their own protocol, their own artistic titles, their own plebeian stigmas.

As so often happens, the thing left undone tires you most of all, you only feel rested when it has been accomplished.

We know that happiness is short-lived, that we fail to cherish it when it is within our grasp and value it only when it has vanished forever.

When I am occupied with a work that requires continuity - a novel, for example - I write every day.

In general, fakirs, like scribes and potters, are sitting down, when he's standing up, a fakir is just like an other man, and sitting down, he'll be smaller than the others.

There are such moments in life, when, in order for heaven to open, it is necessary for a door to close.

I was a good pupil at primary school: in the second class I was writing with no spelling mistakes, and the third and fourth classes were done in a single year.