“I've always been one to prefer dimbling down country lanes on me own cod mumbling to myself in some kind of mad ecstasy with a strange feeling of happiness in my step.”

“Sometimes I feel as if there's an explanation to my life that continues to escape me; that I've missed something noble, something sublime; that in some way I have cheated myself...life is so strange, so harsh.”

“Some guys step on a rake in the dark, and get mad and go punch somebody. Others step on a rake in the dark and fall down laughing at themselves. I know which kind of guy I'd rather be. So do my friends.”

“All I want to be is very young always and very irresponsible and to feel that my life is my own-to live and be happy and die in my own way to please myself”

“I've always loved books. I was an avid reader, with any number of my own stories rolling around in my head. Writing them down seemed a logical step.”

“Dorothy did not feel nearly so bad as you might think a little girl who had been so suddenly whisked away from her own country and set down in the middle of a strange land”