“Woman is sacred the woman one loves is holy.”

“I am not proud, but I am happy; and happiness blinds, I think, more than pride.”

“Happiness is like those palaces in fairytales whose gates are guarded by dragons: We must fight in order to conquer it.”

“True love always makes a man better, no matter what woman inspires it.”

“Love is the most selfish of all the passions.”

“He who has felt the deepest grief is best able to experience supreme happiness.”

“Seek a slower, simpler life.”

“There is no such thing as escape after all, only an exchange of one set of difficulties for another. It wasn't Mark or the farm or marriage I was trying to shake loose from but my own imperfect sel...”

“Talking won't change it. But sometimes it was what she wanted most, to tell someone; often, though, she just wanted to escape those horrid feelings, to escape herself, so there was no pain, no fear...”

“We are all so guilty at the way we have allowed the world around us to become more ugly and tasteless every year that we surrender to terror and steep ourselves in it.”

“Prison always has been a good place for writers, killing, as it does, the twin demons of mobility and diversion”

“All others are outside myself;I lock my door and bar them outThe turmoil, tedium, gad-about.I lock my door upon myself,And bar them out; but who shall wallSelf from myself, most loathed of all?If I...”