The literary man? An indiscreet man, who devaluates his miseries, divulges them, tells them like so many beads: immodesty-the sideshow of second thoughts-is his rule; he offers himself.

The universal view melts things into a blur.

There is no other world. Nor even this one. What, then, is there? The inner smile provoked in us by the patent nonexistence of both.

Do I look like someone who has something to do here on earth?' —That's what I'd like to answer the busybodies who inquire into my activities.

You are done for - a living dead man - not when you stop loving but stop hating. Hatred preserves: in it, in its chemistry, resides the mystery of life.

Our first intuitions are the true ones.

The fact that life has no meaning is a reason to live - moreover, the only one.

Impossible to spend sleepless nights and accomplish anything: if, in my youth, my parents had not financed my insomnias, I should surely have killed myself.

The aphorism is cultivated only by those who have known fear in the midst of words, that fear of collapsing with all the words.

The multiplication of our kind borders on the obscene; the duty to love them, on the preposterous.

Only optimists commit suicide, optimists who no longer succeed at being optimists. The others, having no reason to live, why would they have any to die?

Those who believe they can move mountains, do. Those who believe they can't, cannot. Belief triggers the power to do.

Possession without understanding leads to loss

A month before graduation I got an off-Broadway job. Then I did some commercials, including one for MCI. You can only see half of me, but it paid well. Thank God for commercials.

Australia must prioritise education spending. It is not a question of whether or not we have the money, it is a question of how we choose to spend it.

Here’s to books, the cheapest vacation you can buy.

I agree that there are things that should be kept secret.

Without bigots, eccentrics, cranks and heretics the world would not progress.

You see how fake it all is. It's not even hard enough to be made out of plastic. It's a paper town.

Today, we're encouraged to believe that we should have a verbal interpretation for what we view as art - when in fact the words are an intrusion on the experience.

When we look at a painting, listen to a piece of music, read a novel, or watch a movie we are taking in the artist's composition. The composition is the totality of the work.