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.

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

A good novel is a conjunction of many factors, the main of which is without a doubt, hard work.

We were trained as writers with the idea that literature is something that can change reality, that it's not just a very sophisticated entertainment, but a way to act.

Whether religious or racial, anti-Semitism is always repugnant, one of the most destructive manifestations of human stupidity and evil. What is profoundly expressed in it is man's traditional mistrust of the man who is not part of his tribe, that 'other' who speaks a different language, whose skin is a different color, and who participates in mysterious rites and rituals.

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.

No democracy is born perfect, and none ever gets to be perfect. Yet democracy is superior to authoritarian and totalitarian regimes because, unlike them, democracy is perfectible.