Most authors seek fame, but I seek for justice—a holier impulse than ever entered into the ambitious struggles of the votaries of that fickle, flirting goddess.

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.

Reality is always the foe of famous names.

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

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

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.

What is popularly called fame is nothing but an empty name and a legacy from paganism.

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

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

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

Famous, adj. Conspicuously miserable.

Happy is the man who hath never known what it is to taste of fame—to have it is a purgatory, to want it is a hell!

There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.