All our Western thought is founded on this repulsive pretence that pain is the proper price of any good thing.
Rebecca WestHatred of domestic work is a natural and admirable result of civilization. ... The first thing a woman does when she gets a little money into her hands is to hire some other poor wretch to do her housework.
Rebecca WestThe mind is its own enemy, that fights itself with the innumerable pliant and ineluctable arms of the octopus.
Rebecca WestThe word 'idiot' comes from a Greek root meaning private person. Idiocy is the female defect: intent on their private lives, women follow their fate through a darkness deep as that cast by malformed cells in the brain. It is no worse than the male defect, which is lunacy: men are so obsessed by public affairs that they see the world as by moonlight, which shows the outlines of every object but not the details indicative of their nature.
Rebecca West