“In literature the ambition of the novice is to acquire the literary language; the struggle of the adept is to get rid of it.”

“If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.”

“I owe all my originality, such as it is, to my determination not to be a literary man. Instead of belonging to a literary club I belong to a municipal council. Instead of drinking and discussing authors and reviews, I sit on committees with capable practical greengrocers and bootmakers... Keep away from books and from men who get their ideas from books, and your own books will always be fresh.”

“Custom will reconcile people to any atrocity, and fashion will drive them to acquire any custom.”

“Literature is too full of 'acknowledgments' and squabbles about originality...”

“Wilde's permanent celebrity belongs to literature, and only his transient notoriety to police news.”

“The reason why the continental European is, to the Englishman or American, so surprisingly ignorant of the Bible, is that the authorized English version is a great work of literary art, and the continental versions are comparatively artless.”