I have always made an effort to render every detail of my reality with the greatest accuracy; but I have never paid attention to whether my presentation of historical facts was an exact one.

Asking the author of historical novels to teach you about history is like expecting the composer of a melody to provide answers about radio transmission.

An action doesn't have to be wrong just because it is not logical. It doesn't have to be right just because it has its logic.

There's only a step from the sublime to the ridiculous, but there's no road leading from the ridiculous to the sublime.

An author who sets about to depict events of the past that have run their course is suspected of wishing to avoid the problems of the present day, of being, in other words, a reactionary.

Ever since my youth it has disturbed me that of the literary works that survived their own epoch, so many dealt with historical rather than contemporary subjects.

I have always made an effort to render every detail of my reality with the greatest accuracy; but I have never paid attention to whether my presentation of historical facts was an exact one.