Winning Nobel imposed on me a lifestyle to which I am not used and which I would not have preferred.

You know what I'm afraid of? That God is sick of us.

When you spend time with your friends, what do you talk about? Those things which made an impression on you that day, that week ... I write stories the same way. Events at home, in school, at work, in the street, these are the bases for a story. Some experiences leave such a deep impression that instead of talking about them at the club I work them into a novel.

There are no heroes in most of my stories. I look at our society with a critical eye and find nothing extraordinary in the people I see.

The criminal is trying to solve his immediate problems.

Writing is for men who can think and feel, not mindless sensation seekers out of nightclubs and bars. But these are bad times. We are condemned to work with upstarts, clowns who no doubt got their training in a circus and then turned to journalism as the appropriate place to display their tricks.

You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers. You can tell whether a man is wise by his questions.