There are moments when you feel free, moments when you have energy, moments when you have hope, but you can't rely on any of these things to see you through. Circumstances do that.

You can never betray the people who are dead, so you go on being a public Jew; the dead can't answer slurs, but I'm here. I would love to think that Jesus wants me for a sunbeam, but he doesn't.

Existentialism is about being a saint without God; being your own hero, without all the sanction and support of religion or society.

A complete woman is probably not a very admirable creature. She is manipulative, uses other people to get her own way, and works within whatever system she is in.

Great writers are the saints for the godless.

What is interesting about self-analysis is that it leads nowhere - it is an art form in itself.

It will be a pity if women in the more conventional mould are to be phased out, for there will never be anyone to go home to.

Writing novels preserves you in a state of innocence - a lot passes you by - simply because your attention is otherwise diverted.

Real love is a pilgrimage. It happens when there is no strategy, but it is very rare because most people are strategists.

Life... is not simply a series of exciting new ventures. The future is not always a whole new ball game. There tends to be unfinished business. One trails all sorts of things around with one, things that simply won't be got rid of.

In real life, of course, it is the hare that wins. Every time. Look around you.

There are moments when you feel free, moments when you have energy, moments when you have hope, but you can't rely on any of these things to see you through. Circumstances do that.

All good fortune is a gift of the gods, and you don't win the favor of the ancient gods by being good, but by being bold.

You have no idea how promising the world begins to look once you have decided to have it all for yourself. And how much healthier your decisions are once they become entirely selfish.

It is my contention that Aesop was writing for the tortoise market. hares have no time to read.

In real life, it is the hare who wins. Every time. Look around you. And in any case it is my contention that Aesop was writing for the tortoise market. Hares have no time to read. They are too busy winning the game.

The essence of romantic love is that wonderful beginning, after which sadness and impossibility may become the rule.

No blame should attach to telling the truth. But it does, it does.

Accountability in friendship is the equivalent of love without strategy.

Old men should have more care to end life well than to live long.

A man of such obvious and exemplary charm must be a liar.

You never know what you will learn till you start writing. Then you discover truths you never knew existed.

Good women always think it is their fault when someone else is being offensive. Bad women never take the blame for anything.

Like many rich men, he thought in anecdotes; like many simple women, she thought in terms of biography.

The lessons taught in great books are misleading. The commerce in life is rarely so simple and never so just.

Time misspent in youth is sometimes all the freedom one ever has.

I was a teacher most of my life, which I loved. I had a very happy working life, and when I retired, I thought I must do something, and I've always read a lot of fiction - you learn so much from fiction. My sentimental education came mostly from fiction, I should say, so I thought I'd try.

A complete woman is probably not a very admirable creature. She is manipulative uses other people to get her own way and works within whatever system she is in.

What is interesting about self analysis is that it leads nowhere it is an art form in itself.

Writing novels preserves you in a state of innocence, a lot passes you by, simply because your attention is otherwise diverted.

Romanticism is not just a mode; it literally eats into every life. Women will never get rid of just waiting for the right man.

Satire is dependent on strong beliefs, and on strong beliefs wounded.

Every American deserves to live in freedom, to have his or her privacy respected and a chance to go as far as their ability and effort will take them - regardless of race, gender, ethnicity or economic circumstances.

Journeys, like artists, are born and not made. A thousand differing circumstances contribute to them, few of them willed or determined by the will-whatever we may think.

Achievement is not always success, while reputed failure often is. It is honest endeavor, persistent effort to do the best possible under any and all circumstances.

I came from poverty and was part of those circumstances.

Great joy, especially after a sudden change of circumstances, is apt to be silent, and dwells rather in the heart than on the tongue.

Historical methodology, as I see it, is a product of common sense applied to circumstances.

Planets are too dim to be detected with existing equipment, far away, except in these very special circumstances where they're seen by their gravitational effect.

Because of our social circumstances, male and female are really two cultures and their life experiences are utterly different.

A politics that is not sensitive to the concerns and circumstances of people's lives, a politics that does not speak to and include people, is an intellectually arrogant politics that deserves to fail.

Let everyone regulate his conduct... by the golden rule of doing to others as in similar circumstances we would have them do to us, and the path of duty will be clear before him.

There are no absolute rules of conduct, either in peace or war. Everything depends on circumstances.

Libertarians typically argue that particular obligations, at least under normal circumstances, must be created by consent; they cannot be unilaterally imposed by others.

Until fighting ends and there are conditions, which allow the free expression of will by the people, there can be no elections and elections are not held in these circumstances anywhere in the world.

You mustn't forget the circumstances I have been brought up in, the little education I have had.

Our character is not so much the product of race and heredity as of those circumstances by which nature forms our habits, by which we are nurtured and live.

To know all about anything is to know how to deal with it under all circumstances.

I do not pretend to write much of a letter. You know under what circumstances I am writing.