“One must turn the tongue seven times in the mouth before speaking.”

The photographic image is a message without a code.

It must always be considered as though spoken by a character in a novel

Man does not exist prior to language, either as a species or as an individual.

Every object in the world can pass from a closed, silent existence to an oral state, open to appropriation by society, for there is no law, whether natural or not, which forbids talking about things

I try to busy myself elsewhere, to arrive late; but I always lose at this game. Whatever I do, I find myself there, with nothing to do, punctual, even ahead of time.

To know that one does not write for the other, to know that these things I am going to write will never cause me to be loved by the one I love (the other), to know that writing compensates for nothing, sublimates nothing, that it is precisely there where you are not–this is the beginning of writing.

Don’t say mourning. It’s too psychoanalytic. I’m not mourning. I’m suffering.

Each of us has his own rhythm of suffering.

Someone tells me: this kind of love is not viable. But how can you evaluate viability? Why is the viable a Good Thing? Why is it better to last than to burn?

It is no longer the sexual which is indecent, it is the sentimental.

I call the discourse of power any discourse that engenders blame, hence guilt, in its recipient.

What the Photograph reproduces to infinity has occurred only once: the Photograph mechanically repeats what could never be repeated existentially.

Every photograph is a certificate of presence.

The birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the Author.

Pleasure is continually disappointed, reduced, deflated, in favor of strong, noble values: Truth, Death, Progress, Struggle, Joy, etc. Its victorious rival is Desire: we are always being told about Desire, never about Pleasure.

Language is legislation, speech is its code. We do not see the power which is in speech because we forget that all speech is a classification, and that all classifications are oppressive.

Never love someone just to replace the one you loved.

The English follow the principle that when one lies, one should lie big, and stick to it. They keep up their lies, even at the risk of looking ridiculous.

One shouldn’t be too inquisitive in life Either about God’s secrets or one’s wife.

Trains, like time and tide, stop for no one.

Before all masters, necessity is the one most listened to, and who teaches the best.

The reason we have few friends in adversity, is, because we have no true ones in prosperity.

We see that science is eminently perfectible, and that each theory has constantly to give way to a fresh one.

One cannot violate the promptings of one’s nature without having that nature recoil upon itself.