No matter how ephemeral it is, a novel is something, while despair is nothing.

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.

No matter how ephemeral it is, a novel is something, while despair is nothing.

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.

Literature is a form of permanent insurrection. Its mission is to arouse, to disturb, to alarm, to keep men in a constant state of dissatisfaction with themselves.

If you are killed because you are a writer, that's the maximum expression of respect, you know.

The worst thing that can happen to an artist is to be subsidized by the state. It leads to an intellectual and artistic castration.