There is a close relationship between flowers and convicts. The fragility and delicacy of the former are of the same nature as the brutal insensitivity of the latter. – Jean Genet
Would Hamlet have felt the delicious fascination of suicide if he hadnt had an audience, and lines to speak? – Jean Genet
A man must dream a long time in order to act with grandeur, and dreaming is nursed in darkness. – Jean Genet
I recognize in thieves, traitors and murderers, in the ruthless and the cunning, a deep beauty – a sunken beauty. – Jean Genet
Books of quotation are not only of importance to the reader for what they contain of matured thought, but also for what they suggest. Our brains receive the spark and become luminous, like inflammable material by the contact of flint and steel. – Maturin M. Ballou, January 1886, preface to Edge-Tools of Speech