“So you, too, like fruitcake? (RW on meeting Lenin in Zurich during World War I.)”

“I learned three things in Zurich during the war. I wrote them down. Firstly, you’re either a revolutionary or you’re not, and if you’re not you might as well be an artist as anything else. Secondly, if you can’t be an artist, you might as well be a revolutionary... I forget the third thing.”

“She was so beautiful, like someone who you will never meet, but always dream of meeting, like someone who is too good for you.”

“We need more fruitcakes in this world, and less bakers!”

“A brick is like fruitcake. You don’t want to use it up all at once, and in fact, you don’t want to use it up at all. Well, if you won’t use it, then give it to someone who will. Every other Christmas I get the gift of fruitcake—and I think it’s the same loaf that I gave to that person the year before.
”

“A woman without a past is like a fruitcake without brandy—insipid!”