Progress was a labyrinth ... people plunging blindly in and then rushing wildly back, shouting that they had found it ... the invisible king-the élan vital-the principle of evolution ... writing a book, starting a war, founding a school.

Any person with any imagination is bound to be afraid.

Books are like brothers. I am an only child. Gatsby [is] my imaginary eldest brother.

So he waited, listening for a moment longer to the tuning-fork that had been struck upon a star.

He was so terrible that he was no longer terrible, only dehumanized.

I like people and I like them to like me, but I wear my heart where God put it, on the inside.

The best of America drifts to Paris. The American in Paris is the best American. It is more fun for an intelligent person to live in an intelligent country. France has the only two things toward which we drift as we grow older—intelligence and good manners.