Aristocracy's only an admission that certain traits which we call fine - courage and honor and beauty and all that sort of thing - can best be developed in a favorable environment, where you don't have the warpings of ignorance and necessity.

Strange children should smile at each other and say, "Let's play.

It is in the thirties that we want friends. In the forties we know they won't save us any more than love did.

sometimes i wish i'd been an englishman; american life is so damned dumb and stupid and healthy

Suddenly she realized that what she was regretting was not the lost past but the lost future, not what had not been but what would never be.

A squalid phantasmagoria of breath

As we passed over the dark bridge her wan face fell lazily against my coat's shoulder and the formidable stroke of thirty died away with the reassuring pressure of her hand.