It just happened. As though a moment comes when it's both necessary and natural to make a decision that has long since been made.

It was night and I could see a large and calm lake, reflecting the moon. Black mountains rose around it. I arrived from between two of these mountains, I looked at the lake and the moon, and that was it, nothing else happened.

I adore life but I don't fear death. I just prefer to die as late as possible.

I saw Mussolini tirelessly contemplate a parade of thousands of young men.

The place smelled of fairgrounds, of lazy crowds, of nights when you stayed out because you couldn't go to bed, and it smelled like New York, of its calm and brutal indifference.

Writing is not a profession but a vocation of unhappiness