The only lies for which we are truly punished are those we tell ourselves.

That element of surprise is what I look for when I am writing. It is my way of judging what I am doing - which is never an easy thing to do.

The world is what it is; men who are nothing, who allow themselves to become nothing, have no place in it.

One isn’t born one’s self. One is born with a mass of expectations, a mass of other people’s ideas – and you have to work through it all.

Most people are not really free. They are confined by the niche in the world that they carve out for themselves. They limit themselves to fewer possibilities by the narrowness of their vision.

It is wrong to have an ideal view of the world. That's where the mischief starts. That's where everything starts unravelling.

Home is, I suppose just a child's idea. A house at night, and a lamp in the house. A place to feel safe.

One always writes comedy at the moment of deepest hysteria.

The world is always in movement.

All the details of the life and the quirks and the friendships can be laid out for us, but the mystery of the writing will remain. No amount of documentation, however fascinating, can take us there.

I read a piece of writing and within a paragraph or two I know whether it is by a woman or not.

You smell so good, ""No, I don't, I smell like death.""You're crazy, you're not dead. You do not smell like death.""I was dead a long time.""And now you're not. Hence the alive smell.

Lack of money is no poverty.

The day I found my smile again was when I stood in my own storm and danced with my tribe.

It doesn't matter if you do everything right, if you dress the right way and act the right way and follow all the rules, because evil will find you anyway. Evil's resourceful that way.

All I want is to preserve that wonderful something which so purely exists between us.

I think accessibility is what often denies horror its deserved attention. So it all depends on the execution and whether mainstream audiences can accept it.

All growth, including political growth, is the result of risk-taking.

Go to work! Go to work in the morn of a new creation... until you have... reached the height of self-progress, and from that pinnacle bestow upon the world a civilization of your own.

My mum made a conscious decision not to teach me any Indian languages so I wouldn't talk with an accent.

I know I'm not a bully and everybody has their opinions and that's fine with me.