Say the most personal thing, say it, nothing else matters, don’t be ashamed, the generalities can be found in the newspaper. - Elias Canetti

She was crude, but loyal. He began to understand her even better than before. A pity she was so old; it was too late to try to make a human being of her.

People should not make a virtue out of their sensitivity. They may experience it and preserve it as it was experienced. But they should not adorn themselves with it. Sensitivity will make an addict out of anyone who displays its medals on his chest. He will require more and more objects to enable him to demonstrate his sensitivity, and if he runs out of them, he will simply make things up - and his sensitivity will then reveal itself for what it is: precious, brittle, and rotted through and through.

I can’t be twenty-two again. I can’t subject myself to the same compulsion that, at the time, appeared to me as freedom and gave me wings.