The purpose of art ... is not to reflect life but to organize it, to build it.

We comes from God, I from the Devil.

The lilac branches are bowed under the weight of the flowers: blooming is hard, and the most important thing is - to bloom. (“A Story About The Most Important Thing”)

The nights were long, like the braids of a pretty girl, and the days were short, like a girl's sense. ("The North")

Heretics are the only bitter remedy against the entropy of human thought.

True literature can exist only where it is created, not by diligent and trustworthy functionaries, but by madmen, hermits, heretics, dreamers, rebels, and skeptics.

A man is like a novel: until the very last page you don't know how it will end. Otherwise it wouldn't be worth reading.

Those two, in paradise, were given a choice: happiness without freedom, or freedom without happiness. There was no third alternative.

Literature is painting, architecture, and music.

There is no final one; revolutions are infinite.

We need writers who fear nothing. ("Our Goal")

What keeps you confident in a healthy way is knowing that everyone else around you is going to support you and teach you and you're going to learn from them. I just feel open to learning from people.

Protection and security are only valuable if they do not cramp life excessively.

There's something scary about the unknown. And maybe the scariest movies couldn't ever be made because they are too deep in somebody's head, too unknown to get out.

Oh, 1994, April 27. There won't be a day like that ever again. I mean, the sky was blue, with a blueness that had never been there before.

Point out a great strength of someone in your life today!

It's all up to you, girls. You have to be strong. These are the days of post-women's liberation. You have grown up by now and you have to take care of yourself. No one's going to help you.

Making 'Beloved' was an awesome experience.

I am not an economist. I am an honest man!

We in the House of Lords are never in touch with public opinion. That makes us a civilised body.

I don't need to manufacture trauma in my life to be creative. I have a big enough reservoir of sadness or emotional trauma to last me.