“The absence of the will to live is, alas, not sufficient to make one want to die.”

“Life is painful and disappointing. It is useless, therefore, to write new realistic novels. We generally know where we stand in relation to reality and dont care to know any more.”

“People often say that the English are very cold fish, very reserved, that they have a way of looking at things even tragedy with a sense of irony. Theres some truth in it; its pretty stupid of th...”

“Maybe I should have gone into politics. If you were a political activist, election season brought moments of intensity, whichever side you were on, and meanwhile here I was inarguably withering away,”

“In societies like ours sex truly represents a second system of differentiation, completely independent of money; and as a system of differentiation it functions mercilessly. The effects of these tw...”

“The world outside had its own rules, and those rules were not human.”

“Happiness and the absurd are two sons of the same earth. They are inseparable.”

“We can regard our life as a uselessly disturbing episode in the blissful repose of nothingness.”

“We no longer believe because it is absurd: it is absurd because we must believe.”

“Only once in your life, I truly believe, you find someone who can completely turn your world around. You tell them things that youve never shared with another soul and they absorb everything you sa...”

“As he read, I fell in love the way you fall asleep: slowly, and then all at once.”

“I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you simply, without problems or pride: I love you in this way because I do not know any other way of loving but this, in which there i...”

“I think that when you are famous every weakness is exaggerated.”

“My strength and my weakness are twins in the same womb.”

“Only strength can cooperate. Weakness can only beg.”