“Consolation for those moments when you can’t tell whether you’re the divinest genius or the greatest fool in the world.”

He smiled the most exquisite smile, veiled by memory, tinged by dreams.

The extraordinary woman depends on the ordinary woman.

I will go down with my colours flying.

Blame it or praise it, there is no denying the wild horse in us.

Writing is like sex. First you do it for love, then you do it for your friends, and then you do it for money.

Love had a thousand shapes.

It was a silly, silly dream, being unhappy.

I see you everywhere, in the stars, in the river, to me you’re everything that exists; the reality of everything.

I would venture to guess that Anon, who wrote so many poems without signing them, was often a woman.

We are the words; we are the music; we are the thing itself.

I thought how unpleasant it is to be locked out; and I thought how it is worse, perhaps, to be locked in.

I enjoy the spring more than the autumn now. One does, I think, as one gets older.

A self that goes on changing is a self that goes on living.

The mind must be allowed to settle undisturbed over the object in order to secrete the pearl.

I can only note that the past is beautiful because one never realises an emotion at the time. It expands later, and thus we don’t have complete emotions about the present, only about the past.

When you consider things like the stars, our affairs don’t seem to matter very much, do they?

A love of nature is a consolation against failure.

Next to the consolations of divine grace, it is the most sovereign balm to the miseries of life, both in him who is the object of it, and in him who exercises it.

The Bahá´í Faith is consolation for humanity.

Examining the world in order to find consolation is very much like looking carefully over the pages of a great book in order to find our own name . … Whether we find what we want or not, our preoccupation has hindered us from a true knowledge of the contents.

A world in which time is absolute is a world of consolation. For while the movements of people are unpredictable, the movement of time is predictable.

A world in which time is absolute is a world of consolation.

I write what I call ‘novels of consolation’ for people who are bright and sophisticated.

None better suited to the cure of our temporal ills than a friend to whom we may turn for consolation in time of trouble, and with whom we may share happiness in time of joy.