I tore myself away from the safe comfort of certainties through my love for truth - and truth rewarded me.

Harmony between two individuals is never granted-it has to be conquered indefinitely.

There are moments when you have to write certain things and you don't have to think of your sex. If you are writing about the population of the thirteenth district in Paris, even if you are writing on the women in the thirteenth district, there's no need to consider your sex.

Words have to murder reality before they can hold it captive.

The way I approached a question, my habit of mind, the way I looked at things, what I took for granted - all this was myself and it did not seem to me that I could alter it.

There is not a single line in this diary that does not call for a correction or a denial...Yes: throughout these pages I meant what I was writing and I meant the opposite; reading them again I feel completely lost...I was lying to myself. How I lied to myself!

I realized that even if we went on talking till Judgment Day, I would still find the time all too short.