“Not only should you not accept a prize. You should not try to deserve one either.”

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.

I’m still me even after all that’s happened.

I’m under no illusion that there are things about me that I’d like to change. I just accept who I am, and I’m proud of it.

From someone who doesn’t want to share your destiny, you should neither accept a cigarette.

On radio and television, magazines and the movies, you can’t tell what you’re going to get. When you look at the comic page, you can usually depend on something acceptable by the entire family.

Being cool is being your own self, not doing something that someone else is telling you to do.

Whenever you say ‘yes’ to anything, there is less of you for something else. Make sure your ‘yes’ is worth the less.

When we have accepted the worst, we have nothing more to lose. And that automatically means we have everything to gain.

People must be taken as they are, and we should never try make them or ourselves better by quarreling with them.