The diary taught me that it is in the moments of emotional crisis that human beings reveal themselves most accurately. I learned to choose the heightened moments because they are the moments of revelation.

I hate rarely, though when I hate, I hate murderously.

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.

In my childhood diary I wrote: “I have decided that it is better not to love anyone, because when you love people, then you have to be separated from them, and that hurts too much.

We write to taste life twice, in the moment, and in retrospection.

perhaps the only magician we have is the artist.

I prefer by far the warmth and softness to mere brilliancy and coldness. Some people remind me of sharp dazzling diamonds. Valuable but lifeless and loveless. Others, of the simplest field flowers, with hearts full of dew and with all the tints of celestial beauty reflected in their modest petals.