At first, when an idea, a poem, or the desire to write takes hold of you, work is a pleasure, a delight, and your enthusiasm knows no bounds. But later on you work with difficulty, doggedly, desperately. For once you have committed yourself to a particular work, inspiration changes its form and becomes an obsession, like a love-affair… which haunts you night and day! Once at grips with a work, we must master it completely before we can recover our idleness.

Hero worship has died with heroes, and if someone bows down today, it is to pick up something.

To be married is to be neither alone nor together.

There are. intangible realities which float near us, formless and without words; realities which no one has thought out, and which are excluded for lack of interpreters.

I am not a bibliophile but a humanophile: I look for rare human beings.

To think about and prepare for war is boring, boring for everyone. It's being locked in barracks.

The finest life is spent creating oneself, not procreating.