Fame will go by and, so long, I’ve had you, fame. If it goes by, I’ve always known it was fickle. So at least it’s something I experienced, but that’s not where I live.

What a heavy burden is a name that has become too famous.

Wood burns because it has the proper stuff in it, and a man becomes famous because he has the proper stuff in him.

Fame is no sanctuary from the passing of youth. Suicide is much easier and more acceptable in Hollywood than growing old gracefully.

I am sick and tired of publicity. I want no more of it. It puts me in a bad light. I just want to be forgotten.

Being a star has made it possible for me to get insulted in places where the average Negro could never hope to go and get insulted.

Men are generally more pleased with a widespread than with a great reputation.

Possessions, outward success, publicity, luxury—to me these have always been contemptible. I believe that a simple and unassuming manner of life is best for everyone, best both for the body and the mind.

I’m afraid of losing my obscurity. Genuineness only thrives in the dark. Like celery.

Worldly fame is but a breath of wind that blows now this way, now that, and changes names as it changes in direction.

They are trying to make me into a fixed star. I am an irregular planet.

There lurks in every human heart a desire of distinction which inclines every man first to hope and then to believe that nature has given him something peculiar to himself. 

Reality is always the foe of famous names.