A non-writing writer is a monster courting insanity."

[Letter to Max Brod, July 5, 1922]

I write differently from what I speak, I speak differently from what I think, I think differently from the way I ought to think, and so it all proceeds into deepest darkness.

Writing is a sweet, wonderful reward

Writing is utter solitude, the descent into the cold abyss of oneself.

Every word first looks around in every direction before letting itself be written down by me.

I need solitude for my writing; not 'like a hermit' - that wouldn't be enough - but like a dead man.