But to make the intangible tangible, to pick the emotion out of the air and make it true for others, is both the blessing and the curse of the writer, for the thing between book covers is never as beautiful as the thing he imagined.

A woman has got to love a bad man once or twice in her life, to be thankful for a good one.

It's very important to be just to other people. It takes years and years of living to learn that injustice against oneself is always unimportant.

Personal publicity is apt to be dangerous to any writer's integrity; for the moment he begins to fancy himself as quite a person, a taint creeps into his work.

Readers themselves, I think, contribute to a book. They add their own imaginations, and it is as though the writer only gave them something to work on, and they did the rest.

to comfort any mortal against loneliness, one other is enough.

Ants in the house seem to be, not intruders, but the owners.