“there's no beauty without poignancy and there's no poignancy without the feeling that it's going, men, names, books, houses--bound for dust--mortal--"a small boy appeared beside them and, swinging a handful of banana peels, flung them valiantly in the direction of the potomac.”

“I want it to smell of magnolias insteadof peanuts and I want my shoes to crunch on the same gravel that Lee'sboots crunched on. There's no beauty without poignancy and there's nopoignancy without the feeling that it's going, men, names, books,houses--bound for dust--mortal--”

“Most people think everybody feels about them much more violently than they actually do; they think other people's opinions of them swing through great arcs of approval or disapproval.”

“I love New York on summer afternoons when everyone's away. There's something very sensuous about it - overripe, as if all sorts of funny fruits were going to fall into your hands.”

“She was beautiful - but especially she was without mercy.”

“There's no substitute for will. Sometimes you have to fake will when you don't feel it at all.”

“Beauty and love pass, I know... Oh, there's sadness, too. I suppose all great happiness is a little sad. Beauty means the scent of roses and then the death of roses-”