Everything should be first-rate in a person, his face, clothes, soul and thoughts.

Knowledge is of no value unless you put it into practice.

Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.

Love, friendship and respect do not unite people as much as common hatred for something.

Do silly things. Foolishness is a great deal more vital and healthy than our straining and striving after a meaningful life.

Everything on earth is beautiful, everything -- except what we ourselves think and do when we forget the higher purposes of life and our own human dignity.

The task of a writer is not to solve the problem but to state the problem correctly.

Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.

What a fine weather today! Can’t choose whether to drink tea or to hang myself.

People should be beautiful in every way - in their faces, in the way they dress, in their thoughts, and in their innermost selves.

Life is given only once, and one wants to live it boldly, with full conscious and beauty.

When I feel the beauty in words, I am sensing the logic of heart.

To be admitted to Nature's hearth costs nothing. None is excluded, but excludes himself. You have only to push aside the curtain.

The great irony is that people who live in remote areas, who are illiterate and don't own TVs, are in some ways more free because they are beyond the reach of indoctrination by the modern mass media.

You can feel compassion for others without feeling victimized yourself.

Mobs have passions, not brains.

To a crazy ship, all winds are contrary.

I'm a big fan of the Russians: Isaac Babel is just an exquisite line-to-line stylist.

Children can tell you what Channel 7 says, but not what Matthew 7 says.

I'm not creating an enigma or leaving mystery, I'm just respecting myself enough as an artist to give myself room to grow and not to be devoured all in one go.

Competition breeds excellence, including in the GOP race.