One's existence should be in two parts: one should live like a bourgeois and think like a demigod.

Travel makes one modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world.

Do not read, as children do, to amuse yourself, or like the ambitious, for the purpose of instruction. No, read in order to live.

I believe that if one always looked at the skies, one would end up with wings.

It seems to me that I have always existed and that I possess memories that date back to the Pharaohs.

Stupidity is something unshakable; nothing attacks it without breaking itself against it; it is of the nature of granite, hard and resistant.

Human speech is like a cracked kettle on which we tap crude rhythms for bears to dance to, while we long to make music that will melt the stars.

A man is a critic when he cannot be an artist, in the same way that a man becomes an informer when he cannot be a soldier.

I tried to discover, in the rumor of forests and waves, words that other men could not hear, and I pricked up my ears to listen to the revelation of their harmony.

There is not a particle of life which does not bear poetry within it

To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost.

Life goes on and off

Guilt: the gift that keeps on giving.

You are not what you want. You are what wants you back.

I do not wish a foreign army to spill the blood of my people.

You can actually be intimate with the universe.

When I was filming the death scene [in Inglourious Basterds], and I'm killing somebody, I had to work myself up.

It's not necessary to tell all you know.

Energy is that amazing feeling that comes to life inside of you when you're happy and believe in yourself.

True forgiveness is a self-healing process which starts with you and gradually extends to everyone else.

Be careful when you take on debt. If you take on debt personally, make sure it is small. If you take on large debt, make sure someone else is paying for it.