One can show no greater respect than to weep for a stranger.

anyone who gets up early by inclination or has been forced to rise early out of necessity finds it intolerable that others should go on sleeping soundly

As my cat would say, all hours are good for sleeping.

If we cannot live entirely like human beings, at least let us do everything in our power not to live entirely like animals.

That it's possible not to see a lie even when it's in front of us.

In effect I am not a novelist, but rather a failed essayist who started to write novels because he didn't know how to write essays.

I'm not pessimistic. It is the world that is terrible. How can we be optimistic in the face of a planet where people live so badly, nature is being destroyed and the dominant empire is money?