Girls usually have a papier mache face on their wedding day.

As for an authentic villain, the real thing, the absolute, the artist, one rarely meets him even once in a lifetime. The ordinary bad hat is always in part a decent fellow.

The writer who loses his self-doubt, who gives way as he grows old to a sudden euphoria, to prolixity, should stop writing immediately: the time has come for him to lay aside his pen.

It is not a bad thing that children should occasionally, and politely, put parents in their place.

A bed, a nice fresh bed with smoothly drawn sheets and a hot water bottle at the end of it, soft to the feet like a live animal's tummy.

The true traveller is he who goes on foot, and even then, he sits down a lot of the time.

It takes time for the absent to assume their true shape in our thoughts. After death they take on a firmer outline and then cease to change.

You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm.

What a wonderful life I've had! I only wish I'd realized it sooner.

There is nothing that gives more assurance than a mask.