Solitude gives birth to the original in us, to beauty unfamiliar and perilous – to poetry. But also, it gives birth to the opposite: to the perverse, the illicit, the absurd. – Thomas Mann
No one remains quite what he was when he recognizes himself. – Thomas Mann
Respectable means rich, and decent means poor. I should die if I heard my family called decent. – Thomas Mann
It is a strange fact that freedom and equality, the two basic ideas of democracy, are to some extent contradictory. Logically considered, freedom and equality are mutually exclusive, just as society and the individual are mutually exclusive. – Thomas Mann