“We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don’t like?”

Wealth is an inborn attitude of mind, like poverty. The pauper who has made his pile may flaunt his spoils, but cannot wear them plausibly.

Art is not a pastime but a priesthood.

You’ve never seen death? Look in the mirror every day and you will see it like bees working in a glass hive.

Every day in the mirror I watch death at work.

Since the day of my birth, my death began its walk. It is walking toward me, without hurrying.

Do as the beautiful woman: see to your figure and your petticoats. Though, of course, I am not speaking literally.

There’s no such thing as love; only proof of love.

Nothing ever gets anywhere. The earth keeps turning round and gets nowhere. The moment is the only thing that counts.

The eyes of the dead are closed gently; we also have to open gently the eyes of the living.

After you have written a thing and you reread it, there is always the temptation to fix it up, to improve it, to remove its poison, blunt its sting.

It is excruciating to be an unbeliever with a spirit that is deeply religious.

I love cats because I enjoy my home; and little by little, they become its visible soul.

Youth is certain what it rejects before it knows what it will accept.

Film will only became an art when its materials are as inexpensive as pencil and paper.

Tact in audacity is knowing how far you can go without going too far.

I have not looked at a newspaper in twenty years; if one is brought into the room, I flee. This is not because I am indifferent but because one cannot follow every road.