Can you imagine a writer in England influencing? Absolutely not. And in France? It used to be, but no more-absolutely not. France used to, at least, have writers as diplomats, but not any more.

I cannot live with someone who can't live without me.

In various and different circumstances certain objects and individuals are going to turn out to be vital. The wager of survival cannot, by its nature, reveal which, in advance of events.

The solitude of writing is also quite frightening. It's quite close to madness, one just disappears for a day and loses touch.

Censorship may have to do with literature; but literature has nothing whatever to do with censorship.

Your whole life you are really writing one book, which is an attempt to grasp the consciousness of your time and place– a single book written from different stages of your ability.

There is no moral authority like that of sacrifice.