I know that I am what I am. But I am not sure what I am.

Some loves are like a vice that has ceased to give pleasure.

People who abhor solitude may abhor company almost as much.

After an argument, silence may mean acceptance or the continuation of resistance by other means.

Humor does not rescue us from unhappiness, but enables us to move back from it a little.

Malice is always authentic and sincere.

Rage is exciting, but leaves me confused and exhausted.

The aim of literary ambition is to demonstrate one's greatness of soul.

Fail, and your friends feel superior. Succeed, and they feel resentful.

Mistakes are the only universal form of originality.

The beginning of self-knowledge: recognizing that your motives are the same as other people's.

My thought has been shaped by books; my desires by pictures.

Lying just for the fun of it is either art or pathology.

The discontented believe that their regrets are about the past.

Totem poles and wooden masks no longer suggest tribal villages but fashionable drawing rooms in New York and Paris.

Hatred of the mother is familiar, but the mother's hatred still comes as a surprise.

Expensive advertising courts us with hints and images. The ordinary kind merely says, Buy.

Worried about being a dull fellow? You might develop your talent for being irritating.

The higher the moral tone, the more suspect the speaker.

Other people's beliefs may be myths, but not mine.

Death is frightening, and so is Eternal Life.

Old age: I fall asleep during the funerals of my friends.

First literature came to refer only to itself, the literary theory.

Rereading, we find a new book.

Art seduces, but does not exploit.

Young men preen. Old men scheme.

General statements omit what we really want to know. Example: some horses run faster than others.

Sincerity: willingness to spend one's own money.

To understand a literary style, consider what it omits.

In love, we worry more about the meaning of silences than the meaning of words.

It is possible to interpret without observing, but not to observe without interpreting.

Events are called inevitable only after they have occurred.

A great reader seldom recognizes his solitude.

The passions are the same in every conflict, large or small.

In bridge clubs and in councils of state, the passions are the same.

Kafka: cries of helplessness in twenty powerful volumes.

Few friendships could survive the moodiness of love affairs.

Thinking about the universe has now been handed over to specialists. The rest of us merely read about it.

At sixty, I know little more about wisdom than I did at thirty, but I know a great deal more about folly.

Often, when I want to consult my impulses, I cannot find them.

If I play hard to get, soon the phone stops ringing altogether.

Reason enables us to get around in the world of ideas, but cannot prescribe our thoughts.

Even boredom has its crises.

Fears and lies intensify consciousness.

For many, immaturity is an ideal, not a defect.

Logic and fact keep interfering with the easy flow of conversation.

The only peace is being out of earshot.

Folly always knows the answer.

Every literary critic believes he will outwit history and have the last word.

The novel avoids the sublime and seeks out the interesting.