"I am reading six books at once, the only way of reading; since, as you will agree, one book is only a single unaccompanied note, and to get the full sound, one needs ten others at the same time."

"Why do we always think of the past as so much more beautiful than the present?"

"Fiction is like a spider's web, attached ever so lightly perhaps, but still attached to life at all four corners."

"The mind is an enchanting thing."

"My own brain is to me the most unaccountable of machines — always buzzing, humming, soaring, diving, and then buried in a bog. And the only way in which I can manage it and make it work is by turning …"