“Real life doesn't grant us many of the more than useful possibilities people can come out with in fiction.”

“I look around and see that many — not all, but many — problems we've got could be solved if our culture simply fostered the habit of reading. Reading books of science, philosophy, history. Reading literature of quality, the sort that touches us because of a more profound reason, such as, for instance, because it's got something to say beyond all the futilities and trifles of life, even while depicting the ordinary in life, at the same time that it says it with style, in a unique, admirable manner. An original one. We are not a county of readers, notwithstanding. We are the country of football turned into a cult, of guile being ranked high as a cardinal virtue, of Carnival made for exportation. A country where there are more letters in political party acronyms than in all many of our politicians have written in a lifetime. A country where ethics has become a joke theme. Where democracy is but a ridiculous puppet theatre.Yes, I look around and see that many problems could be solved if we had the habit of reading. But I am not even sure whether there is someone reading these words.”

“Reading is accumulating knowledge. But not only that. Reading offers us every day what religion promises us for a posthumous and improbable future: the possibility of living beyond what our lifetime allows us to.”

“The point is: have you ever noticed how we crush a cockroach without further worry and feel no remorse in spite of being in fact terminating a life? That's it. We do so because we don't identify ourselves with a cockroach. Because it's very diffent from us. [...] Thinking from that side, I suppose some people tend to do the same towards others. I mean, they see from distance those they don't identify with on the spot, do you get me? It's as if the stranger, who doesn't belong to the same group as we do, was seen as an inferior being... Almost a cockroach!”

“A vida real não nos concede muitas possibilidades mais do que úteis que as pessoas podem ter na ficção.”

“NOTHING MAKES SENSE. Do not look for any sense in things. It is not there. It is you who ascribe it to what you live or get to know. A defeat or a victory is neither a message from the gods nor a trick of fate. Neither means anything — and, if they seem to, it is but an interpretation you yourself make of them —, inasmuch as things in themselves are only indifference and silence. So, do not waste your precious time in looking for signs everywhere around you. Try and interpret happenings, those which bleed and those which make you smile, as maturing experiences. Oh, yes, what is most important: live!”

“Muita gente fala que é preciso aprender com o exemplo dos pais e dos professores e coisa e tal. Pode até ser! Não foi o que aconteceu comigo, mas pode ser! Só acho que estão deixando de colocar um fator importante nessa soma de quem nos influencia. Algumas vezes, para um garoto encontrar o caminho certo, é preciso que seu guia, seu modelo inspirador, seja como um reflexo dele mesmo no espelho, alguém com quem consiga se identificar de fato, entende? Refiro-me a se identificar principalmente nessa coisa da idade.”