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Books aren’t made in the way that babies are: they are made like pyramids, There’s some long-pondered plan, and then great blocks of stone are placed ...more

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The artist must manage to make posterity believe that he never existed.

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The public wants work which flatters its illusions.

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It seems to me, alas, that if you can so thoroughly dissect your children who are still to be born, you don’t get horny enough to actually to father t...more

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In my view, the novelist has no right to express his opinions on the things of this world. In creating, he must imitate God: do his job and then shut ...more

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You don’t make art out of good intentions.

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Better to work for yourself alone. You do as you like and follow your own ideas, you admire yourself and please yourself: isn’t that the main thing? A...more

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One day, I shall explode like an artillery shell and all my bits will be found on the writing table.

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The writer must wade into life as into the sea, but only up to the navel.

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I’m dazzled by your facility. In ten days you’ll have written six stories! I don’t understand it… I’m like one of those old aqueducts: there’s so much...more

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Come, let’s be calm: no one incapable of restraint was ever a writer.

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When one does something, one must do it wholly and well. Those bastard existences where you sell suet all day and write poetry at night are made for m...more

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To return to antiquity [in literature]: that has been done. To return to the Middle Ages: that too has been done. Remains the present day. But the gro...more

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It would have been better to do what everyone else does, neither taking life too seriously nor seeing it as merely grotesque, choosing a profession an...more

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There comes a point at which you stop writing and think all the more