Violence commands both literature and life, and violence is always crude and distorted.

Although the primitive in art may be both interesting and impressive, as portrayed in American fiction it is conspicuous for dullness alone. Drab persons living drab lives, observed by drab minds and reported in drab writing.

It would appear, from the best examples, that the proper way of beginning a preface to one's work is with a humble apology for having written at all.

... the life of the mind is reality, and love without romantic illumination is a spiritless matter.

No matter how vital experience might be while you lived it, no sooner was it ended and dead than it became as lifeless as the piles of dry dust in a school history book.

But youth isn't happy. Youth is sadder than age.

Yes, I learned long ago that the only satisfaction of authorship lies in finding the very few who understand what we mean. As for outside rewards, there is not one that I have ever discovered.