I think a book should be judged 10 years later, after reading and re-reading it.

You can be obsessed by remorse all your life, not because you chose the wrong thing- you can always repent, atone : but because you never had the chance to prove to yourself that you would have chosen the right thing.

I'm always fascinated by losers. Also, in my "Foucault's Pendulum," the main characters, who are in a way losers, they are more interesting than the winners.

I wrote a novel because I had a yen to do it. I believe this is sufficient reason to set out to tell a story.

Entering a novel is like going on a climb in the mountains: You have to learn the rhythms of respiration - acquire the pace. Otherwise you stop right away.

Where else? I belong to a lost generation and am comfortable only in the company of others who are lost and lonely.

What does culture want? To make infinity comprehensible.