When we invent, the surprise of our invention eludes us, since we prepare it and adjust it. But time passes. And, when we have not retained the memory of its laborious production, it surprises us. […] What comforts us in what we have made is neither the recognition by others, nor the moment of sale and the profit that results from it, nor the admiration of some, but the expectation of these unpredictable returns. It is not another world or posterity through centuries that motivates us: it is forgetting what we have done and which comes back to us as a new light, that destines our life to a short circuit of astonishment and annihilation of ourselves. These are ecstasies.

Pascal Quignard, The Hatred of Music (1996)