“You have to begin to lose your memory, if only in bits and pieces, to realize that memory is what makes our lives. Life without memory is no life at all, just as an intelligence without the possibility of expression is not really an intelligence. Our memory is our coherence, our reason, our feeling, even our action. Without it, we are nothing.”

“Somewhere between chance and mystery lies imagination, the only thing that protects our freedom, despite the fact that people keep trying to reduce it or kill it off altogether.”

“All my life I've been harassed by questions: Why is something this way and not another? How do you account for that? This rage to understand, to fill in the blanks, only makes life more banal. If we could only find the courage to leave our destiny to chance, to accept the fundamental mystery of our lives, then we might be closer to the sort of happiness that comes with innocence.”

“If someone were to tell me I had twenty years left, and ask me how I'd like to spend them, I'd reply 'Give me two hours a day of activity, and I'll take the other twenty-two in dreams.'”

“God and Country are an unbeatable team; they break all records for oppression and bloodshed.”

“In any society, the artist has a responsibility. His effectiveness is certainly limited and a painter or writer cannot change the world. But they can keep an essential margin of non-conformity alive. Thanks to them the powerful can never affirm that everyone agrees with their acts. That small difference is important.”

“If alcohol is queen, then tobacco is her consort. It's a fond companion for all occasions, a loyal friend through fair weather and foul. People smoke to celebrate a happy moment, or to hide a bitter regret. Whether you're alone or with friends, it's a joy for all the senses. What lovelier sight is there than that double row of white cigarettes, lined up like soldiers on parade and wrapped in silver paper? I love to touch the pack in my pocket, open it, savor the feel of the cigarette between my fingers, the paper on my lips, the taste of tobacco on my tongue. I love to watch the flame spurt up, love to watch it come closer and closer, filling me with its warmth.”

“If you were to ask me if I'd ever had the bad luck to miss my daily cocktail, I'd have to say that I doubt it; where certain things are concerned, I plan ahead.”

“Salvador Dali seduced many ladies, particularly American ladies, but these seductions usually consisted of stripping them naked in his apartment, frying a couple of eggs, putting them on the woman's shoulders and, without a word, showing them the door.”

“The decline of the aperitif may well be one of the most depressing phenomena of our time.”

“A paranoiac, like a poet, is born, not made.”

“I can only wait for the final amnesia, the one that can erase an entire life.”

“I'm still an atheist, thank God”

“In the name of Hippocrates, doctors have invented the most exquisite form of torture ever known to man: survival.”

“Tobacco and alcohol, delicious fathers of abiding friendships and fertile reveries.”

“If someone were to prove to me - right this minute - that God, in all his luminousness, exists, it wouldn't change a single aspect of my behavior”

“Frankly, despite my horror of the press, I'd love to rise from the grave every ten years or so and go buy a few newspapers.”

“A writer or painter cannot change the world. But they can keep an essential margin of nonconformity alive.”

“The discreet charm of the bourgeoisie”

“If the devil were to offer me a resurgence of what is commonly called virility, I'd decline. ''Just keep my liver and lungs in good working order,'' I'd reply, ''so I can go on drinking and smoking!''”