"My intention was to write a chapter of the moral history of my country and I chose Dublin for the scene because that city seemed to me the centre of paralysis."

"I am a man who has always been a student of life."

"The artist is a man who is always trying to create something new, something that has never been seen before."

"The artist, like the God of the creation, remains within or behind or beyond or above his handiwork, invisible, refined out of existence, indifferent, paring his fingernails."

"I have been writing for twenty years, and I have only just begun to learn how to write."