"I was never revolutionary. The only revolutionary in our time was Strauss!"

“My works are 12-tone compositions, not 12-tone compositions”

“I see the work as a whole first. Then I compose the details. In working out, I always lose something. This cannot be avoided. There is always some loss when we materialize. But there is compensating gain in vitality.”

“I have never seen faces, but because I have looked people in the eye, only their gazes.”

“I find above all that the expression, "atonal music," is most unfortunate — it is on a par with calling flying "the art of not falling," or swimming "the art of not drowning.”

“Now we will throw these mediocre kitsch-mongers into slavery, and teach them to venerate the German spirit and to worship the German God.”

“I have just read your book from cover to cover, and I will read it once more. I find it pleasing to an extraordinary degree, because we agree on nearly all of the main issues..”