Father died last year. I don't subscribe to the theory by which we only become truly adult when our parents die; we never become truly adult.

On Sunday morning I went out for a while in the neighbourhood; I bought some raisin bread. The day was warm but a little sad, as Sundays often are in Paris, especially when one doesn't believe in God.

Now abideth beauty, truth, and intensity; but the greatest of these is intensity.

Adolescence is not only an important period in life, but that it is the only period where one may speak of life in the full sense of the word.

If life is an illusion it's a pretty painful one.

Without beauty a girl is unhappy because she has missed her chance to be loved. People do not jeer at her, they are not cruel to her, but it is as if she were invisible, no eyes follow her as she walks. People feel uncomfortable when they are with her. They find it easier to ignore her. A girl who is exceptionally beautiful, on the other hand, who has something which too far surpasses the customary seductive freshness of adolescence, appears somehow unreal. Great beauty seems invariably to portend some tragic fate.

Using a big word like 'plagiarism'... always causes some damage. It will always do lasting damage, like accusations of racism.