Does it not occur to people that I might be artificial by nature?

We should always remember that sensitiveness and emotion constitute the real content of a work of art

Why become a second-rate Ravel when you're already a first-rate Gershwin?

My intention here is to make it clear that not a single cell of my composition, here in regard to The Raven, is found by chance or intuition, that the composition moved towards perfection with the precision and inevitability of a mathematical equation.

I am not one of the great composers. All the great have produced enormously. There is everything in their work - the best and the worst, but there is always quantity. But I have written relatively little.

I do not ask for my music to be interpreted, but only for it to be played.

I begin by considering an effect.