I am reading Henry James...and feel myself as one entombed in a block of smooth amber.

Never are voices so beautiful as on a winter's evening, when dusk almost hides the body, and they seem to issue from nothingness with a note of intimacy seldom heard by day.

For it is a curious fact that though human beings have such imperfect means of communication, that they can only say 'good to eat' when they mean 'beautiful' and the other way about, they will yet endure ridicule and misunderstanding rather than keep any experience to themselves.

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.

Vain trifles as they seem, clothes have, they say, more important offices than to merely keep us warm. They change our view of the world and the world's view of us.

You cannot cross the narrow bridge of art carrying all its tools in your hands. Some you must leave behind.

No passion is stronger in the breast of man than the desire to make others believe as he believes