Caitlin Thomas Quotations

Between threading a needle and raving insanity is the smallest eye in creation.

[On journalists:] They are as disruptive a menace to the public body: as grating turds in the intestines are to the private body.

[On journalists:] ... however lyingly libellous they may be: nobody can seriously hurt the reputation of a Great person. If he is hurt: he is not Great. They can but scratch at his skin with their mice nails.

none of what I know is out of books. ... I prefer tactual learning. Touching, on the quick of the sore nail, of present, mobile life. To toy, to gnaw, to tear: at the living element of pain. Like at a living drumstick.

money ... is only important when you have none; and though it may not be everything, it goes a very long way towards blocking up the winter draft of age.

One should never go back to a place one has loved; for, however, rough the going forward is, it is better than the snuffing out-of-love return.

So it is useless to evade reality, because it only makes it more virulent in the end. But instead, look steadfastly into the slit, pin-pointed, malignant eyes of reality: as an old-hand trainer dominates his wild beasts. Take it by the scruff of the neck, and shake the evil intent out of it; till it rattles out harmlessly, like gall bladder stones, fossilized on the floor.

resignation, perhaps the most stifling word in the language.

Love can bear anything better than ridicule.

There is a great gulf between the really creative person and normal people. The totally creative person does not have the rest of his life in proper proportion.