Reality is always the foe of famous names.

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.

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

Famous, adj. Conspicuously miserable.

Avoid the talk of men. For talk is mischievous, light, and easily raised, but hard to bear and difficult to be rid of. Talk never wholly dies away when many people voice her: even talk is in some ways divine.

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. 

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.

When I do a show, the whole show revolves around me, and if I don’t show up, they can just forget it.

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

And what will history say of me a thousand years hence?

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

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

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