"There's always something real in what happens, no avoiding that." —César Aira (as translated by Katherine Silver), The Literary Conference

"Thinking should be finer than the thinnest gas in the world, so that it can seep through the gaps in this so-called reality and reach the unknown.  For that's where true reality begins, in the world of dwarfs and dragons.  We knew that as children without having to understand it.  Only when we lost the ability to act unreasonably did we lose the true, that is the unreal, reality.  There is no return.  There is also no progress.  No going forwards or backwards.  Cheers.  In each case it's only a superficial impression we can make on this hard-boiled reality of ours.  For at very best it's only an optical illusion.  If a drunkard sees a row of houses swaying, that's serious.  Not for the drunkard, but for the houses.  They just won't stand up if one's vision methodically sets out to bring them down.  Isn't the whole world based on vision?  A long look into one's glass and one's vision rocks and sways.  But that's all by the way.  It's possible to make the world dissolve without the help of a bottle of schnaps.  It's all a matter of practice." —Ernst Kreuder, The Attic Pretenders

"In the long run, reality turns out to be inextinguishable, unreachable.  One can find out more and more about it, but not everything.  Even so, it's advisable to try to find out a little more, because in certain investigations surprises do occasionally occur." —Enrique Vila-Matas, Dublinesque (highly recommended!)

An illustration from a 1921 issue of Munsey's magazine.  The caption reads: "You aren't in a land of illusion.  You have left the land of illusion behind for all time."