Women scheme when they are weak, they lie out of fear. Men scheme when they are strong, they lie out of arrogance.

The greatest patriotism is to tell your country when it is behaving dishonorably, foolishly, viciously.

The writer must be universal in sympathy and an outcast by nature: only then can he see clearly.

What is the easiest, the most comfortable thing for a writer to do? To congratulate the society in which he lives: to admire its biceps, applaud its progress, tease it endearingly about its follies.

The best form of government is one that is dying, because that means it’s giving way to something else.

Irony - The modern mode: either the devil’s mark or the snorkel of sanity.

The best life for a writer is the life which helps him write the best books he can.

If the writer were more like a reader, he’d be a reader, not a writer. It’s as uncomplicated as that.

He didn’t really like travel, of course. He liked the idea of travel, and the memory of travel, but not travel itself.

To be stupid, and selfish, and to have good health are the three requirements for happiness - though if stupidity is lacking, the others are useless.

Everything you invent is true: you can be sure of that. Poetry is a subject as precise as geometry.

Get the big picture! See 2 Believe!

Journalistic information and presentation actually discourage action... we think we know, and because we think we know, we think we care. But it stops there.

No matter what you write or choreograph, you feel it is not enough.

Unfortunately, I have to follow the law.

We always have been, we are, and I hope that we always shall be detested in France.

This is sweet to see your foe, perish and pay to justice all he owes.

Every lie has 2 parts - the lie we tell others and the one we tell ourselves to justify it.

The stage is suspension of disbelief. Film is a literal medium.

It doesn't matter how many times you have failed.... What matters is the successful attempt.

When a new book is published, read an old one.