Regardless of the staggering dimensions of the world about us, the density of our ignorance, the risks of catastrophes to come, and our individual weakness within the immense collectivity, the fact remains that we are absolutely free today if we choose to will our existence in its finiteness, a finiteness which is open on the infinite. And in fact, any man who has known real loves, real revolts, real desires, and real will knows quite well that he has no need of any outside guarantee to be sure of his goals; their certitude comes from his own drive.

For years I thought my work still lay ahead, and now I find it is behind me: there was no moment when it took place.

In a way, literature is true than life,' he said to himself. 'On paper, you say exactly and completely what you feel. How easy it is to break things off on paper! You hate, you shout, you kill, you commit suicide; you carry things to the very end. And that's why it's false. But it's damned satisfying. In life, you're constantly denying yourself, and others are always contradicting you. On paper, I make time stand still and I impose my convictions on the whole world; they become the only reality.

Each of us is responsible for everything and to every human being.

As long as the family and the myth of the family ... have not been destroyed, women will still be oppressed.

there is a poetry in making preserves; the housewife has caught duration in the snare of sugar, she has enclosed life in jars.

One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman.