"I have a profound conviction that the world is a species of gigantic jest—a jest of the most elaborate and stupendous—of the most complicated and august—and of the most utterly incomprehensible charac…"

"True! - nervous - very, very nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my senses, not destroyed, not dulled them. Above all was the sense of hearing acut…"

"It has not been in the pursuit of pleasure that I have periled life and reputation and reason. It has been the desperate attempt to escape from torturing memories, from a sense of insupportable loneli…"

"Art is to look at not to criticize."

"From childhood's hour I have not been. As others were, I have not seen. As others saw; I could not awaken. My heart to joy at the same tone. And all I loved, I loved alone."