But why wasn't I born, alas, in an age of Adjectives; why can one no longer write of silver-shedding Tears and moon-tailed Peacocks, of eloquent Death, of the Negro and star-enameled Night?

I might give my life for my friend, but he had better not ask me to do up a parcel.

But why wasn't I born, alas, in an age of Adjectives; why can one no longer write of silver-shedding Tears and moon-tailed Peacocks, of eloquent Death, of the Negro and star-enameled Night?

To become young again would seem to me an appalling prospect. Youth is a kind of delirium, which can be cured, if it is ever cured at all, by years of painful treatment.

All our lives we are putting pennies — our most golden pennies — into penny-in-the-slot machines that are almost always empty.

People say that life is the thing, but I prefer reading.

The word snob belongs to the sour-grape vocabulary.