You may think me crude, and probably I am crude, but I am not so crude as I was, for I am clever enough to see that the girl of nineteen who thought herself a genius was only an unusual girl writing her heart out.

One must always say things that aim to interest, because in the world one must after all pay for one's keep.

I began to be a woman at twelve, or more properly, a genius.

I would rather be a fairly happy wife and mother.

People say of me, 'She's peculiar.' They do not understand me. If they did they would say so oftener and with emphasis.

May I never, I say, become that abnormal, merciless animal, that deformed monstrosity - a virtuous woman.

When I was three years old I was taken with my family to a little town in Western Minnesota, where I lived a more or less vapid and ordinary life until I was ten.