then, as though it had been waiting on a near by roof for their arrival, the moon came slanting suddenly through the vines and turned the girl's face the color of white roses.

Gatsby turned out all right at the end; it is what preyed on Gatsby, what foul dust floated in the wake of his dreams that temporarily closed out my interest in the abortive sorrows and short-winded elations of men.

Nobody ever became a writer just by wanting to be one.

The sign of intelligence is the ability to carry opposed thoughts at the same time.

There was not a moving up into vacated places; there was simply an anachronistic staying on between a vanishing past and an incalculable future.

You will walk differently alone, dear, through a thicker atmosphere, forcing your way through the shadows of chairs, through the dripping smoke of the funnels. You will feel your own reflection sliding along the eyes of those who look at you. You are no longer insulated; but I suppose you must touch life in order to spring from it.

I was in love with a whirlwind, so when the girl threw me over, I went home and finished my novel.