Man seeks to escape himself in myth, and does so by any means at his disposal. Drugs, alcohol, or lies. Unable to withdraw into himself, he disguises himself. Lies and inaccuracy give him a few moments of comfort.

Take a commonplace, clean it and polish it, light it so that it produces the same effect of youth and freshness and originality and spontaneity as it did originally, and you have done a poet's job. The rest is literature.

What the public criticizes in you, cultivate. It is you.

There are truths which one can only say after having won the right to say them.

A writer's definitive death is when no one reads his books anymore. That's the final death.

You cut off the capacity for grief in your life, and you cut off the joy at the same time. They both come up through the same tunnel. You don't have one without the other.

If life after death really does exist, everyone probably gets what they expect to get, because that's the only thing I can think of that would be fair.

The political, social, and spiritual impact of the life example set by Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela might be measured in part by the profound and unique gestures made by people in different countries to honor his life upon learning of his death.