Literature is an occupation in which you have to keep proving your talent to people who have none.
Talent is a question of quantity. Talent does not write one page; it writes three hundred.
I find that when I do not think of myself I do not think at all.
Let us stay at home: there we are decent. Let us not go out: our defects wait for us at the door, like flies.
Words should be only the clothes, carefully custom-made to fit the thought.
Broken china lasts longer than unbroken.
To think is not enough, you must think of something.
The horse is the only animal into which one can bang nails.
There are places and moments in which one is so completely alone that one sees the world entire.
Don’t tell a woman she’s pretty; tell her there’s no other woman like her, and all roads will open to you.
We are so happy to advise others that occasionally we even do it in their interest.
A beautiful line of verse has twelve feet, and two wings.
Truth makes many appeals, not the least of which is its power to shock.
Art: to nudge truth along a little.
It is in the midst of the city that one writes the most inspiring pages about the country.
The strong do not hesitate. They settle down, they sweat, they go on to the end. They exhaust the ink, they use up the paper.
Talent is like money; you don’t have to have some to talk about it.
There is a justice, but we do not always see it. Discreet, smiling, it is there, at one side, a little behind injustice, which makes a big noise.
True courage consists in being courageous precisely when when we’re not.
I don’t claim to have taste, but of my distaste I am very sure .
The more one reads, the less one imitates. –.