“[M]ay not literature (and, in particular, fiction) be considered a desperate and permanently thwarted effort to produce a unique form of expression? Something like a cry, perhaps, a cry that, someh...”

“I thought that to get to know a desert it was enough to have been there. I thought that to have seen the dogs dying along the Cholula road, or to have seen the eyes of the lepers at Chiengmai gave ...”

“All words are possible, then, all names. They rain down, all these words, they disintegrate into a powdery avalanche. Belched from the volcano's mouth, they spurt in to the sky, then fall again. In...”

“He who writes books that aim to convince is a comedian, too, just a comedian. What has he got to offer others, apart from chains, still more chains? Fiction never liberated anyone. No one ever brou...”

“There is no such thing as self-awareness. Imagine thought retreating into itself to think about itself. It would be easier to imagine a revolver bullet extracting itself from its victim's wound and...”

“I wanted to write an adventure story, not, it's true, I really did. I shall have failed, that's all. Adventures bore me. I have no idea how to talk about countries, how to make people wish they had...”

“Nothing here is more fabulous than the truth”

“The earth is neither fabulous nor paradisal. And therefore it is not hell.”

“To work hard, to live hard, to die hard, and then go to hell after all would be too damn hard.”

“What is hell? I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love.”

“I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia.”

“Peace be upon you, for you have persevered! How excellent, then, this fulfilment in the hereafter!”

“she ran away in her sleep and dreamed of paradise”

“Maybe it takes tragedy to create paradise.”