I think I am a much better actor than I have allowed myself to be.

The Greek word for "return" is nostos. Algos means "suffering." So nostalgia is the suffering caused by an unappeased yearning to return.

The stupidity of people comes from having an answer for everything. The wisdom of the novel comes from having a question for everything.

There is a certain part of all of us that lives outside of time. Perhaps we become aware of our age only at exceptional moments and most of the time we are ageless.

Those who consider the Devil to be a partisan of Evil and angels to be warriors for Good accept the demagogy of the angels. Things are clearly more complicated.

Dreaming is not merely an act of communication; it is also an aesthetic activity, a game of the imagination, a game that is a value in itself.

Her drama was a drama not of heaviness but of lightness. What fell to her lot was not the burden but the unbearable lightness of being.

The worst thing is not that the world is unfree, but that people have unlearned their liberty.

When the heart speaks, the mind finds it indecent to object.

In the sunset of dissolution, everything is illuminated by the aura of nostalgia, even the guillotine.

Memory does not make films, it makes photographs.

What needs to be done will be done by grace.

The ability to think for one's self depends upon one's mastery of the language.

Which is a sad thing when you're only seventeen.

Envy will merit, as its shade, pursue

Stories don't give answers, but they do offer perspective.

The paradox of liberal tolerance is that it extends to Marxists, transsexuals, and Islamic radicals, but not to conservatives or Christians.

Censure pardons the ravens but rebukes the doves. [The innocent are punished and the wicked escape.]

Don't ever, ever quit. Recognize that stopping now, regrouping to try a new approach isn't quitting. If you quit you'll regret it forever

It is well to be prepared for life as it is, but it is better to be prepared to make life better than it is.

Be as bold as the first man or [woman] to eat an oyster.