“Not only does the universe have its own laws, all of them indifferent to the contradictory dreams and desires of humanity, and in the formulation of which we contribute not one iota, apart, that is...”

“Whether we like it or not, the one justification for the existence of all religions is death, they need death as much as we need bread to eat.”

“...sometimes I do actually forget that the person to whom I owe that love is a real person, complete in himself, not someone who should make do with some rather diffuse emotion which gradually resi...”

“Men are all the same, they think that because they came out of the belly of a woman they know all there is to know about women.”

“Because each of you has his or her own death, you carry it with you in a secret place from the moment you're born, it belongs to you and you belong to it.”

“The church has never been asked to explain anything, our speciality, along with ballistics, has always been the neutralisation of the overly curious mind through faith.”

“All words are pegs to hang ideas on.”

“A word is not the same with one writer as it is with another. One tears it from his guts. The other pulls it out of his overcoat pocket.”

“No doubt I shall go on writing, stumbling across tundras of unmeaning, planting words like bloody flags in my wake....”