You live like this, sheltered, in a delicate world, and you believe you are living.

the cynic is a coward. He foresees all barrenness so that barrenness can never surprise him.

I sat there for three hours and did not feel the time or the boredom of our talk and its foolish disconnection. As long as I could hear his voice, I was quite lost, quite blind, quite outside my own self.

The same chemicals were used in the cooking as were used on the composition of her own being: only those which caused the most violent reaction, contradiction, and teasing, the refusal to answer questions but the love of putting them, and all the strong spices of human relationship which bore a relation to black pepper, paprika, soybean sauce, ketchup and red peppers.

The body is an instrument which only gives off music when it is used as a body.

Everything with me is either worship and passion or pity and understanding. I hate rarely, though when I hate. I hate murderously.

I am like a snake who has already bitten. I retreat from a direct battle while knowing the slow effect of the poison.