As regards plots I find real life no help at all. Real life seems to have no plots.

[On writing:] What a difficult kind of work to choose! But of course one did not choose it. There was no choice.

Truth is so impossible. Something has to be done for it.

Duty is seldom liked either by the doer or the object ... And why should it be? It is not often of advantage to either.

A plot is like the bones of a person, not interesting like expression, or signs of experience, but the support of the whole.

There is more difference within the sexes than between them.

We none of us talk to people as we do behind their backs.