“Isn't it true (I thought), that one is almost never present, or rather never fully present, and that's because we have only a halfhearted, chaotic and slipshod, disgraceful and vile relationship with out surroundings.”

“I became bold because I had absolutely nothing to lose: neither honors, nor earnings, nor friends. I had to find myself anew and rely only on myself, because I could rely on no one else. My form is my solitude.”

“Not surprisingly, because too much attention to one object leads to distraction, this one object conceals everything else, and when we focus on one point on the map we know that all other points are eluding us.”

“I could have protested of course, who says I couldn't--I could have risen to my feet at any moment, walked up to them, and--no matter how difficult it would have been--made it abundantly clear that I was not seventeen but thirty. I could have--yet I couldn't because I didn't want to, the only thing I wanted was to prove that I was not an old-fashioned boy!”

“It is not without pleasure that i can tell my majestic colleagues who write for humanity, and in the name of humanity, that i have never written a single word other than for a selfish purpose; but at, each time, the work betrayed me and escaped from me”

“Mnie Bóg, w życiu moim, nigdy nie był potrzebny - od najwcześniejszego dzieciństwa, ani przez pięć minut - byłem zawsze samowystarczalny. / I have never in my life needed God - from the infancy, since I was 5, I was self-sufficient. (Dziennik 1956, XVIII Niedziela)”

“Great poetry must be admired, because it is great and because it is poetry, and so we admire it.”