The truths that seem most truthful, if you look at them from all sides, if you look at them close up, turn out to be either half truths or lies.

I have been always fascinated and seduced by history, which I think is very close, very close to literature.

Life is a shitstorm, in which art is our only umbrella." (spoken by character in a novel by Mario Vargas Llosa)

I couldn't imagine any other way of living, outside of books, outside my work. Which doesn't mean I am not interested in other things, of course - I am interested in many things. But the center, the crux, is always literature.

I think in a country like mine, violence is at the root of all human relations.

Once upon a time, there was a boy who learned to read at the age of 5. This changed his life. Owing to the adventure tales he read, he discovered a way to escape from the poor house, the poor country, and the poor reality in which he lived.

Violence represents the worst kind of conformism.