The purpose of literature is to turn blood into ink.

Footfalls echo in the memory, down the passage we did not take, towards the door we never opened, into the rose garden.

You will find that you survive humiliation. And that's an experience of incalculable value.

Most of the trouble in the world is caused by people wanting to be important.

We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.

Let us go then, you and I, When the evening is spread out against the sky Like a patient etherised upon a table; Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets, The muttering retreats 5 Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells: Streets that follow like a tedious argument Of insidious intent To lead you to an overwhelming question … 10 Oh, do not ask, “What is it?” Let us go and make our visit. In the room the women come and go Talking of Michelangelo.

Those who say they give the public what it wants begin by underestimating public taste and end by debauching it.