To teach one’s self is to be forced to learn twice.

For me, the novel is experience illumined by imagination...

One cannot lay a foundation by scattering stones, nor is a reputation for good work to be got by strewing volumes about the world...

There is a terrible loneliness in the spring...

Tilling the fertile soil of man’s vanity.

Surely the novel should be a form of art – but art was not enough. It must contain not only the perfection of art, but the imperfection of nature.

It would appear, from the best examples, that the proper way of beginning a preface to one’s work is with a humble apology for having written at all.

After all, you can’t expect men not to judge by appearances.

Life may take away happiness. But it can’t take away having had it.

As far back as I remember, long before I could write, I had played at making stories. But not until I was seven or more, did I begin to pray every night, “O God, let me write books! Please, God, let me write books!”