"The novel is a mirror that reflects the complexities of society, and the novelist is the one who polishes that mirror."

"Mental life is a continuous adjustment to the environment."

The best way to help people is not to do things for them, but to help them do things for themselves.

Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you walk into an open sewer and die.

Art should be measured by its consequences, not by its beauty.

The very shaping of history now outpaces the ability of men to orient themselves in accordance with cherished values. And which values? Even when they do not panic, men often sense that older ways of feeling and thinking have collapsed and that newer beginnings are ambiguous to the point of moral stasis.