When evil enters the world, do you think it comes with horns and cloven feet, billowing some foul stench?

Experience belongs to the actor, but the story belongs to the teller. We write so we will never forget.

The twentieth century saw a professionalization of fiction writing, particularly in its second half and particularly in the Anglo-Saxon world - not so much mainland Europe, for example.

Our interaction with our friends, for instance, is in large part an interaction with representations in our own head of the people before us. That's why a friend can surprise or disappoint us.

No sight better expresses the politics of aid, the dynamics of the West and the developing countries, than the image of children, happy or in need.

Everything new is on the rim of our view, in the darkness, below the horizon, so that nothing new is visible but in the light of what we know.

That’s another argument for writing: making something that outlasts you.

Then, as now, I believe that the English use language to hide what they mean.

Our choices are made, our will flexed, in the teeth of events that overwhelm us and devour us.

It’s always nice to learn a thing or two from a novel, don’t you think?

It is no consolation to reflect that every cause itself is an effect, making the search for causes and reasons a fool’s errand.

As for man, his days are numbered, whatever he might do, it is but wind.

When painting the faces of young persons ... use the yolk of the egg of a city hen, because they have lighter yolks than those of country hens.

I think imagination is one of the greatest blessings of life.

Voting for the right is doing nothing for it.

Some people don’t respond to civility.

Everyone praises the views you get from mountain tops, but no one talks about the views that they block.

My history is really playing live - not writing or recording.

Spiritual Intelligence represents our drive for meaning and connection with the infinite.

Always look out for the little notes˘like minorities.

I'll continue to carry out whatever we are committed to. Whatever we believe leads us to a permanent solution the way we want it, the way I want it.