Beauty is an ecstasy; it is as simple as hunger.

Nothing in the world is permanent, and we’re foolish when we ask anything to last, but surely we’re still more foolish not to take delight in it while we have it.

We are not the same persons this year as last; nor are those we love. It is a happy chance if we, changing, continue to love a changed person.

To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life.

It's a funny thing about life; if you refuse to accept anything but the best, you very often get it.

If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money that it values more, it will lose that too.

The secret to life is meaningless unless you discover it yourself.

The only important thing in a book is the meaning that it has for you.

It is dangerous to let the public behind the scenes. They are easily disillusioned and then they are angry with you, for it was the illusion they loved.

The common idea that success spoils people by making them vain, egotistic and self-complacent is erroneous; on the contrary it makes them, for the most part, humble, tolerant and kind.

Imagination grows by exercise, and contrary to common belief, is more powerful in the mature than in the young.

To be feared of a thing and yet to do it, is what makes the prettiest kind of a man.

Wanting to cry doesn't mean you can.

If we could but paint with the hand as we see with the eye!

It is amazing how nice people are to you when they know you're going away.

I have no private life at all. I am a hunted woman. I can't take a step without being questioned and surrounded.

Always do what you're afraid to do.

What's good for me is certainly not good for other people.

Drawing is the most direct and personal kind of graphic expression. Unlike painting, it doesn't forgive. You put down your black line, and there it is - as inevitable as death.

But beauty vanishes; beauty passes; However rare rare it be; And when I crumble, who will remember This lady of the West Country?

As we learn about each other, so we learn about ourselves.