The best form of government is one that is dying, because that means it’s giving way to something else.

Because love is the meeting point of truth and magic. Truth, as in photography; magic, as in ballooning.

Memory is identity....You are what you have done; what you have done is in your memory; what you remember defines who you are; when you forget your life you cease to be, even before your death.

Paris is certainly one of the most boastful of cities, and you could argue that it has had a lot to boast about: at various times the European centre of power, of civilisation, of the arts, and (self-advertisingly, at least) of love.

It is a bizarre thought that in this [U.S. 2008] presidential cycle we could have had a woman in the White House we might have a black man in the White House but if either of them had said they were atheists neither of them would have had a hope in hell.

Yes, of course we were pretentious -- what else is youth for?

The more you learn, the less you fear.