I am poor - obscure - just eighteen years of age - with a rapacious appetite for everything and principles as light as my purse.

It's a terrible thing to be alone - yes it is - it is - but don't lower your mask until you have another mask prepared beneath - as terrible as you like - but a mask.

The truth is that every true admirer of the novels cherishes the happy thought that he alone - reading between the lines - has bcome the secret friend of their author.

The pleasure of all reading is doubled when one lives with another who shares the same books.

I really only have Perfect Fun with myself. Other people won't stop and look at the things I want to look at or, if they do, they stop to please me or to humor me or to keep the peace.

I love this place; I love mountains and big skies and forests. And the weather is still supremely beautiful even though the lower peaks are powdered with fresh snow. But Heavens! What sun. It never has an ending. I am basking at this minute - half past four - too hot without a hat, & the sky is that transparent blue only to be seen in autumn - the forest trees steeped in light.

Regret is an appalling waste of energy, and no one who intends to be a writer can afford to indulge in it.