I don't want to be classed as a humorist. It makes me feel guilty. I've never read a good tough quotable female humorist, and I never was one myself. I couldn't do it. A "smartcracker" they called me, and that makes me sick and unhappy. There's a hell of a distance between wisecracking and wit. Wit has truth in it; wisecracking is simply calisthenics with words.

Love is like quicksilver in the hand. Leave the fingers open and it stays. Clutch it and it darts away.

Los Angeles: Seventy-two suburbs in search of a city.

[On being shown an apartment by a real estate agent:] Oh, dear, that's much too big. All I need is room enough to lay a hat and a few friends.

Now, look, baby, 'Union' is spelled with 5 letters. It is not a four-letter word.

all men are the same age.

Four things I am wiser to know: Idleness, sorrow, a friend, and a foe.