I have a chest full of all the insults, villainies, and infamies a man is capable of withstanding. . . . If you become famous, you will have to go through that.

The writer’s job is to write with rigor, with commitment, to defend what they believe with all the talent they have. I think that’s part of the moral obligation of a writer, which cannot be only purely artistic. I think a writer has some kind of responsibility at least to participate in the civic debate. I think literature is impoverished, if it becomes cut from the main agenda of people, of society, of life.

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

We must mistrust utopias: they usually end in holocausts.

There are people with a lot of prejudice, a lot of fear of the unknown. They think that immigration is a danger, when really it is a solution. This is an interesting issue, because it will be a central question of our time.

Writing a book is a very lonely business. You are totally cut off from the rest of the world, submerged in your obsessions and memories.

I completely believe that - literature for me is a way of life. That's probably true of all writers or all artists. I think in the end this kind of activity absorbs one in such a way that it becomes one's way of life.