“To tell the truth, girls are no longer the way they used to be. They play gangsters, nowadays, just like boys. They organize rackets. They plan holdups and practice karate. They will rape defenseless adolescents. They wear pants... Life has become impossible.”

“The true writer has nothing to say. What counts is the way he says it.”

“the world is neither meaningful, nor absurd. it quite simply is, and that, in any case, is what is so remarkable about it.”

“There is a famous Russian cartoon in which a hippopotamus, in the bush, points out a zebra to another hippopotamus: 'You see,' he says, 'now that’s formalism.”

“Love without risk is an impossibility, like war without death.”

“Being content is perhaps no less easy than playing the violin well: and requires no less practice.”

“A 'good job' can be both practically attractive while still not good enough to devote your entire life to.”