No, I'm happy to go on living the life I've chosen. I'm a university teacher and I like my job.

I prefer insomnia to anaesthesia.

I vividly remember the stories my grandfather told me about the carnage of the First World War, which people tend to forget was one of the worst massacres in human history.

It's the job of intellectuals and writers to cast doubt on perfection.

I live quietly at home among my family and friends.

But democracy isn't a state of perfection. It has to be improved, and that means constant vigilance.

People with lots of doubts sometimes find life more oppressive and exhausting than others, but they're more energetic - they aren't robots.

But I don't think I have any particular talent for prediction, because when you have three or four elements in hand, you don't have to be a genius to reach certain conclusions.

There are some fundamental values it's impossible to be wrong about.

Eco sees the intellectual as an organizer of culture, someone who can run a magazine or a museum. An administrator, in fact. I think this is a melancholy situation for an intellectual.

Perfection spawns doctrines, dictators and totalitarian ideas.

Don't forget to wind the restricted clock and put the confidential cat out.

P.I. Cassie Cruise--You don't have to like her, but you damn well better respect her

I’m sure I look a wreck. But he’s the one who wrecked me so he may as well take a good long look at what he’s done.

I don't think any player lives up to his potential, because people out there put you so high on a pedestal, you'll never be as good as they expect.

Point of view is present in anything I write, but I really try to let the subject and facts speak for themselves.

The Netherlands are wet, flat and full of stoned people.

A time will come when you will find that in gaining a brief joy you have lost your peace forever.

It’s okay to wonder how you could try so hard and still get stomped all over. Just don’t let them change you.

What is snowboarding to me? I'd say it's when I feel passion. That is, if passion is a combination of utter joy, frustration and rage. It's my life.

At the end of the day, I don't know what makes any artist say what he says. Everyone has a reason for whatever it is they do.