There is such a thing as everyday, ordinary, vulgar ecstasy; the ecstasy of anger, the ecstasy of speed at the wheel, the ecstasy of ear-splitting noise, ecstasy in the soccer stadium.

Is a novel anything but a trap set for a hero?

Her drama was a drama not of heaviness but of lightness. What fell to her lot was not the burden but the unbearable lightness of being.

Nothing requires a greater effort of thought than arguments to justify the rule of non-thought.

The stupidity of people comes from having an answer for everything. The wisdom of the novel comes from having a question for everything.

Being in a foreign country means walking a tightrope high above the ground without the net afforded a person by the country where he has his family, colleagues, and friends, and where he can easily say what he has to say in a language he has known from childhood.

Forgive me," he went on. "For a long time I have had the peculiar habit of not arriving but appearing.