“To pretend, I actually do the thing: I have therefore only pretended to pretend.”

“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.”

“One should absorb the colour of life, but one should never remember its details. Details are always vulgar.”

“In times like these, it helps to recall that there have always been times like these.”

“A person is always startled when he hears himself seriously called an old man for the first time.”

“I can’t listen to that much Wagner. I start getting the urge to conquer Poland.”

“Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect.”

“Seeing ourselves as others see us would probably confirm our worst suspicions about them.”

“Life is nothing but a competition to be the criminal rather than the victim.”

“Skill without imagination is craftsmanship and gives us many useful objects such as wickerwork picnic baskets. Imagination without skill gives us modern art.”