No, I'm not clever. I've always cared more for people than for ideas.

You have a touch in letter writing that is beyond me. Something unexpected, like coming round a corner in a rose garden and finding it still daylight.

The large shiny black forehead of the first whale was no more than two yards from us when it sank beneath the surface of the water, then we saw the huge blue-black bulk glide quietly under the raft right beneath our feet. It lay there for some time, dark and motionless, and we held our breath as we looked down on the gigantic curved back of a mammal a good deal longer than the raft.

Talents of the novelist: ... observation of character, analysis of emotion, people's feelings, personal relations.

So long as you write what you wish to write, that is all that matters; and whether it matters for ages or only for hours, nobody can say.

With twice his wits, she had to see things through his eyes -- one of the tragedies of married life.

I am in the mood to dissolve in the sky.