Anyone who has the temerity to write about Jane Austen is aware of [two] facts: first, that of all great writers she is the most difficult to catch in the act of greatness; second, that there are twenty-five elderly gentlemen living in the neighbourhood of London who resent any slight upon her genius as if it were an insult to the chastity of their aunts.

But words have been used too often; touched and turned, and left exposed to the dust of the street. The words we seek hang close to the tree. We come at dawn and find them sweet beneath the leaf.

It is the duty of the writer to describe.

I like books whose virtue is all drawn together in a page or two. I like sentences that don't budge though armies cross them.

It is a thousand pities never to say what one feels.

I was lying in bed this morning and saying to myself, 'the remarkable thing about Ethel is her stupendous self-satisfaction' when in came your letter to confirm this profound psychological observation. How delighted I was!

I want some one to sit beside after the day's pursuit and all its anguish, after its listening, its waitings, and its suspicions. After quarreling and reconciliation I need privacy--to be alone with you, to set this hubbub in order. For I am as neat as a cat in my habits.