I have never gone out to mingle with the world without losing something of myself.
I am the only British writer who writes in Spanish
I think writers rush in where everybody is very frightened to tread
When I write, the first blank page, or any blank page, means nothing to me. What means something is a page that has been filled with words.
I think that I've tried many times to get Cuba in my writings, especially Havana, which was once a great and fascinating city.
If the sleep of reason produces monsters, what does the sleep of unreason produce?
What I do believe is that there is always a relationship between writing and reading, a constant interplay between the writer on the one hand and the reader on the other
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure.
[Quantity is the fundamental feature of things,] the 'primarium accidens substantiae,'. . . prior to the other categories.
It is characteristic of the military mentality that non-human factors. . . are held essential, while the human being, his desires and thoughts-in short, the psychological factors-are considered as unimportant and secondary.
If laying aside all worldly Greatness and Vain-Glory, I should be ask'd where I thought it was most probable that Men might enjoy true Happiness, I would prefer a small peaceable Society, in which Men, neither envy'd nor esteem'd by Neighbours, should be contented to live upon the Natural Product of the Spot they inhabit, to a vast Multitude abounding in Wealth and Power, that should always be conquering others by their Arms Abroad, and debauching themselves by Foreign Luxury at Home.