Gertrude Stein

You cannot go into the womb to form the child; it is there and makes itself and comes forth whole-and there it is and you have made it and have felt it, but it has come itself.

The earth is the earth as a peasant sees it, the world is the world as a duchess sees it, and anyway a duchess would be nothing if the earth was not there as the peasant sees it.

The one thing that everybody wants is to be freenot to be managed, threatened, directed, restrained, obliged, fearful, administered, they want none of these things they all want to feel free … The only thing that any one wants now is to be free, to be let alone, to live their life as they can, but not to be watched, controlled and scared, no no, not.

It is awfully important to know what is and what is not your business

A real failure does not need an excuse. It is an end in itself.

The reason why all of us naturally began to live in France is because France has scientific methods, machines and electricity, but does not really believe that these things have anything to do with the real business of living.

It is inevitable when one has a great need of something one finds it. What you need you attract like a lover.

History takes time. History makes memory.

After all everybody, that is, everybody who writes is interested in living inside themselves in order to tell what is inside themselves. That is why writers have to have two countries, the one where they belong and the one in which they live really. The second one is romantic, is is separate from themselves, it is not real but it is really there.

A very important thing is not to make up your mind that you are any one thing.

Writing and reading is to me synonymous with existing.

You look ridiculous if you dance You look ridiculous if you don't dance So you might as well dance.

You are extraordinary within your limits, but your limits are extraordinary!

She always says she dislikes the abnormal, it is so obvious. She says the normal is so much more simply complicated and interesting.