I believe that what separates us all from one another is simply societ — Eugène Ionesco

"Why do people always expect authors to answer questions? I am an author because I want to ask questions. If I had answers, Id be a politician."

"Ionesco believes that the irrational is mans intuitive form of vision. Everything that claims to be rational and realistic is a distortion of that vision, a shield raised against the absurdity of existence."

"I have never been to the Right, nor have I been a Communist, because I have experienced, personally, both forms of totalitarianism. It is those who have never lived under tyranny who call me petit bourgeois."

"It isnt what people think thats important, but the reason they think what they think."

"Everything that has been will be, everything that will be is, everything that will be has been."

"Good men make good rhinoceroses, unfortunately."

"The only influences in [the painting The sick Child, Munch painted in his elderly home, remembering very accurate the last days of his dying little sister Sophie] The sick Child.. ..were the ones that come from my home.. ..my childhood and my home. Only someone who knew the conditions at home could possibly understand why there can be no conceivable chance of any other place having played a part – my home is to my art as a midwife is to her children.. ..few painters have ever experienced the full grief of their subject as I did in The sick child. It was not just I who was suffering; it was all my nearest and dearest as well."

"There was a man and he had eight sons. Apart from that, he was nothing more than a comma on the page of History. Its sad, but thats all you can say about some people."

"Im very sad that this seems to be the No. 1 question people want to discuss. I had nothing to do with the issue other than what the media created. I was innocently drawn into the whole controversy. So, after many years, Im glad at least now that I have been given the opportunity to explain to the public and fans my side of the story in my own words. At a lecture, back in 1989, I was asked a question about blasphemy according to Islamic Law, I simply repeated the legal view according to my limited knowledge of the Scriptural texts, based directly on historical commentaries of the Quran. The next day the newspaper headlines read, "Cat Says, Kill Rushdie." I was abhorred, but what could I do? I was a new Muslim. If you ask a Bible student to quote the legal punishment of a person who commits blasphemy in the Bible, he would be dishonest if he didnt mention Leviticus 24:16."

"Rhymer, brawler, and musician, Famed for his lunar expedition, And the unnumbered duels he fought, — And lover also, — by interposition! — Here lies Hercule Savinien De Cyrano de Bergerac, Who was everything, yet was naught. I cry you pardon, but I may not stay; See, the moon-ray that comes to call me hence! I would not bid you mourn less faithfully That good, brave Christian: I would only ask That when my body shall be cold in clay You wear those sable mourning weeds for two, And mourn awhile for me, in mourning him."

"We must recognize that there is no indication that Saddam Hussein has any intention of relenting. So we have an obligation of enormous consequence, an obligation to guarantee that Saddam Hussein cannot ignore the United Nations. He cannot be permitted to go unobserved and unimpeded toward his horrific objective of amassing a stockpile of weapons of mass destruction."

"—musics power Is little felt in sunlit hour; But hear its voice when hopes depart, Like swallows, flying from the heart On which the summers late decline Has set a sadness and a sign;. . . . . . How deeply will the spirit feel The lute, the songs sweet-voiced appeal; And how the heart drink in their sighs As echoes they from Paradise."