There is only one writer in whom I find something that reminds me of the directness of style which is found in the Bible. It is Shakespeare.

High in the air rises the forest of oaks, high over the oaks soar the eagle, high over the eagle sweep the clouds, high over the clouds gleam the stars... high over the stars sweep the angels.

Round my cradle shimmered the last moonbeams of the eighteenth century and the first morning rays of the nineteenth.

Write . . . write . . . pencil . . . paper.

Nothing is sillier than this charge of plagiarism. There is no sixth commandment in art. The poet dare help himself wherever he lists, wherever he finds material suited to his work. He may even appropriate entire columns with their carved capitals, if the temple he thus supports be a beautiful one. Goethe understood this very well, and so did Shakespeare before him.

Those who begin by burning books will end by burning people.

I do not know the meaning of my sadness; there is an old fairy tale that I cannot get out of my mind.