“An opera begins long before the curtain goes up and ends long after it has come down. It starts in my imagination, it becomes my life, and it stays part of my life long after I’ve left the opera house.”

What is there in life if you do not work? There is only sensation, and there are only a few sensations— you cannot live on them. You can only live on work, by work, through work. How can you live with self-respect if you do not do things as well as lies in you?

When my enemies stop hissing, I shall know I’m slipping.

My poor sight gives me an advantage. I can’t see the people in the audience who are scratching their heads while I am lost in my role and giving everything I have to the drama.

I would not kill my enemies, but I will make them get down on their knees. I will, I can, I must.

I am not an angel and do not pretend to be. That is not one of my roles. But I am not a devil, either. I am a woman and a serious artist, and I would like so to be judged.

I don’t need the money, dear. I work for art.

Only when I was singing did I feel loved.

I cannot switch my voice. My voice is not like an elevator going up and down.

When the curtain rises, the only thing that speaks is courage.

You are born an artist or you are not. And you stay an artist, dear, even if your voice is less of a fireworks. The artist is always there.

That is the difference between good teachers and great teachers: good teachers make the best of a pupil’s means; great teachers foresee a pupil’s ends.

Love is so much better when you are not married.

It’s a terrible thing to go through life thinking that you have a rock on your side when you haven’t.

I was always too mature for my age – and not very happy. I had no young friends. I wish I could go back to those days. If I could only live it all again, how I would play and enjoy other girls. What a fool I was.

Don’t talk to me about rules, dear. Wherever I stay I make the goddam rules.

I will always be as difficult as necessary to achieve the best.

It’s not the end. It’s the beginning.

Where choice begins, Paradise ends, innocence ends, for what is Paradise but the absence of any need to choose this action?

Every story has an end, but every end is a new beginning.

We shall have to begin all over again. [Taft hoped that] the Senators might change their minds, or that the people might change the Senate; instead of which they changed me.

Maybe we could begin entwined – not whole – but one again.

The happy ending is that it is not ending.

I have always felt that doubt was the beginning of wisdom, and the fear of God was the end of wisdom.

My father told me ‘Name your price in the beginning. If it ever gets more expensive than the price you name, get out of there.’