“reason died in 1914, November 1914 ... after that everybody began to rave ...”

“To hell with reality! I want to die in music, not in reason or in prose. People don't deserve the restraint we show by not going into delirium in front of them. To hell with them!”

“you've probably noticed that after the first half-century practically everybody gets leaky, they can't keep it in ... hence the cruelty of long drawn-out meals and drinking sessions ... ships and apartment houses are the same ... everything starts to leak ... sphincters, bladders, drain pipes, bowels ... the half-century is merciless for ladies and gentlemen ... worse for dogs and cats! ... with them it comes sooner! ... five ... six years ...”

“It happened, you see, after the war, when I saw people making money while the others were dying in the trenches. You saw it and you couldn't do anything about it. Then later I was at the League of Nations, and there I saw the light. I really saw the world was ruled by the Golden Calf, by Mammon! Oh, no kidding! Implacably. Social consciousness certainly came to me late.”

“Lie, copulate, and die.”

“In the kitchens of love, after all, vice is like the pepper in a good sauce; it brings out the flavor, it’s indispensable.”

“That is perhaps what we seek throughout life, that and nothing more, the greatest possible sorrow so as to become fully ourselves before dying.”