But Venice, like Oxford, had kept the background for romance, and, to the true romantic, background was everything, or almost everything.

The commonest thing is delightful if only one hides it.

One is tempted to define man as a rational animal who always loses his temper when he is called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason.

No one in particular. A man of no importance.

As a rule, people who act lead the most commonplace lives. They are good husbands, or faithful wives, or something tedious...How different Sibyl was! She lived her finest tragedy.

She is all the great heroines of the world in one. She is more than an individual. I love her, and I must make her love me. I want to make Romeo jealous. I want the dead lovers of the world to hear our laughter, and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion to stir dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain.

And yet I don't suppose that ten per cent of the proletariat live correctly.