Great bodies of people are never responsible for what they do.
A masterpiece is something said once and for all, stated, finished, so that it’s there complete in the mind, if only at the back.
Who shall measure the hat and violence of the poet’s heart when caught and tangled in a woman’s body?
The poet gives us his essence, but prose takes the mold of the body and mind.
That great Cathedral space which was childhood.
One has to secrete a jelly in which to slip quotations down people’s throats – and one always secretes too much jelly.
Nothing induces me to read a novel except when I have to make money by writing about it. I detest them.
I was in a queer mood, thinking myself very old: but now I am a woman again – as I always am when I write.
If one could be friendly with women, what a pleasure – the relationship so secret and private compared with relations with men. Why not write about it truthfully?
One likes people much better when they’re battered down by a prodigious siege of misfortune than when they triumph.
On the outskirts of every agony sits some observant fellow who points.
Boredom is the legitimate kingdom of the philanthropic.
The connection between dress and war is not far to seek; your finest clothes are those you wear as soldiers.
I read the book of Job last night, I don’t think God comes out well in it.
The telephone, which interrupts the most serious conversations and cuts short the most weighty observations, has a romance of its own.
We are nauseated by the sight of trivial personalities decomposing in the eternity of print.
And when we are writing the life of a woman, we may, it is agreed, waive our demand for action, and substitute love instead. Love, the poet has said, is a woman’s whole existence...
This is not writing at all. Indeed, I could say that Shakespeare surpasses literature altogether, if I knew what I meant.
What a lark! What a plunge!
Life stand still here.