The worst thing that can happen to an artist is to be subsidized by the state. It leads to an intellectual and artistic castration.

Memory is a snare, pure and simple; it alters, it subtly rearranges the past to fit the present.

Prosperity or egalitarianism -- you have to choose. I favor freedom -- you never achieve real equality anyway: you simply sacrifice prosperity for an illusion.

Like writing, reading is a protest against the insufficiencies of life.

Life is a shitstorm, in which art is our only umbrella." (spoken by character in a novel by Mario Vargas Llosa)

The secret to a masterpiece is 10 percent inspiration and 90 percent perspiration.

You cannot teach creativity - how to become a good writer. But you can help a young writer discover within himself what kind of writer he would like to be.

Its easy to know what you want to say, but not to say it

Writers are the exorcists of their own demons.

One can't fight with oneself, for this battle has only one loser.

No matter how ephemeral it is, a novel is something, while despair is nothing.

It started to hurt less because it mattered so much less.

There's no doubt in my mind that he wants this and that he loves you, Sam, but sometimes even the strongest feelings in our hearts can't silence the demons in our head.

A lie is nothing more than the truth told in reverse

If his choice now was to risk either sunshine with a chance of rain or heatstroke with a chance of tornado, he’d go with the sunshine.

Be a light unto others, not boastful of self.

Kabul is... a thousand tragedies per square mile.

I really love jazz, but I will never be a jazz musician as much as I dream. But, I think that the jazz music I love is there in my music.

Success isn't about how much money you make, it's about the difference you make in people's lives.

Dont play any notes. Notes are for babies.

A society of children first is a society that nurtures smiling faces in everyone.