If one defends the bourgeois, philistine virtues, one does not defend them merely from the demonism or bohemianism of the artist but from the present bourgeoisie itself.

Ideology is not the product of thought; it is the habit or the ritual of showing respect for certain formulas to which, for various reasons having to do with emotional safety, we have very strong ties of whose meaning and consequences in actuality we have no clear understanding.

The function of literature, through all its mutations, has been to make us aware of the particularity of selves, and the high authority of the self in its quarrel with its society and its culture. Literature is in that sense subversive.

The immature artist imitates. The mature artist steals.

I find righteous denunciations of the present state of the language no less dismaying than the present state of the language.

Immature artists imitate. Mature artists steal.

We are all ill; but even a universal sickness implies an idea of health.