Out in Hollywood, where the streets are paved with Goldwyn, the word "sophisticate" means, very simply, "obscene." A sophisticatedstory is a dirty story. Some of that meaning was wafted eastward and got itself mixed up into the present definition. So that a "sophisticate" means: one who dwells in a tower made of a DuPont substitute for ivory and holds a glass of flat champagne in one hand and an album of dirty post cards in the other.

This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.

Benchley and I had an office in the old Life magazine that was so tiny, if it were an inch smaller it would have been adultery.

The first thing I do in the morning is brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue.

[On Dashiell Hammett:] ... he is so hard-boiled you could roll him on the White House lawn.

Said after she had been seriously ill: The doctors were very brave about it.

You can lead a horticulture, but you can't make her think.