“It is a singular reaction, this sitting still and writing, writing, writing, or ruminating at length, which is much the same, really.”

“The pleasures of writing correspond exactly to the pleasures of reading”

“I think like a genius, I write like a distinguished author, and I speak like a child.”

“a man who has decided upon self-destruction is far removed from mundane affairs, and to sit down and write his will would be, at that moment, an act just as absurd as winding up one’s watch, since together with the man, the whole world is destroyed; the last letter is instantly reduced to dust and, with it, all the postmen; and like smoke, vanishes the estate bequeathed to a nonexistent progeny.”

“If someday I make a dictionary of definitions wanting single words to head them, a cherished entry will be "To abridge, expand, or otherwise alter or cause to be altered for the sake of belated improvement, one's own writings in translation.”

“This, to use an American term in which discovery, retribution, torture, death, eternity appear in the shape of a singularly repulsive nutshell, was it.”

“Even while writing his book, he had become painfully aware how little he knew his own planet while attempting to piece together another one from jagged bits filched from deranged brains.”