Djuna Barnes

Man is the only thing that has no further use after something goes amiss.

— Djuna Barnes

Too great a sense of identity makes a man feel he can do no wrong. And too little does the same.

— Djuna Barnes

And must I, perchance, like careful writers, guard myself against the conclusions of my readers?

— Djuna Barnes

I have a narrative, but you will be put to it to find it.

— Djuna Barnes

Ife is painful, nasty and short.. in my case it has only been painful and nasty.

— Djuna Barnes

I have been loved,' she said, 'by something strange, and it has forgotten me.

— Djuna Barnes

“For a lover who dies, no matter how forgotten, will take somewhat of you to the grave.”

— Djuna Barnes

Of course I think of the past and of Paris, what else is there to remember?

— Djuna Barnes

Una's face was an unbroken block of calculation, saving where, upon her upper lip, a little down of hair fluttered. Yet it…

— Djuna Barnes

In the acceptance of depravity the sense of the past is most truly captured. What is a ruin but time easing itself…

— Djuna Barnes

I couldn't ever boil potatoes over the heat of your affection. Your love would never bridge a gap; it wouldn't even fill…

— Djuna Barnes

New York is the meeting place of the peoples, the only city where you can hardly find a typical American.

— Djuna Barnes

This head has risen above its hair in a moment of abandon known only to men who have drawn their feet out…

— Djuna Barnes

“The doctor lifted the bottle. “Thank you,” said Felix. “I never drink spirits.” “You will,” said the doctor.”

— Djuna Barnes

One must not look inward too much, while the inside is yet tender. I do not wish to frighten myself until I…

— Djuna Barnes

“Oh," he cried. "A broken heart have you! I have falling arches, flying dandruff, a floating kidney, shattered nerves and a broken…

— Djuna Barnes

“No matter where and when you meet him you feel that he has come from some place-no matter from what place he…

— Djuna Barnes

If Helen of Troy could have been seen eating peppermints out of a paper bag, it is highly probable that her admirers…

— Djuna Barnes

One cup poured into another makes different waters; tears shed by one eye would blind if wept into another's eye. The breast…

— Djuna Barnes

“Let us put it the other way, the Lutheran or Protestant church versus the Catholic. The Catholic is the girl that you…

— Djuna Barnes

Our bones ache only while the flesh is on them. Stretch it as thin as the temple flesh of an ailing woman…

— Djuna Barnes

I like my human experience served up with a little silence and restraint. Silence makes experience go further and, when it does…

— Djuna Barnes

When one wants to become cognizant of the color and the texture of the soil, one does not get a ladder; one…

— Djuna Barnes

The unendurable is the beginning of the curve of joy.

— Djuna Barnes

One's life is peculiar to one's own when one has invented it.

— Djuna Barnes

The truth is how you say it, and to be 'one's self' is the most shocking custom of all.

— Djuna Barnes

We are but skin about a wind, with muscles clenched against mortality.

— Djuna Barnes

A man is whole only when he takes into account his shadow.

— Djuna Barnes

“Man has no foothold that is not also a bargain. So be it!”

— Djuna Barnes

“To our friends,' he answered, 'we die every day, but to ourselves we die only at the end.”

— Djuna Barnes

None of us suffers as much as we should, or loves as much as we say. Love is the first lie; wisdom…

— Djuna Barnes

“From the half-open doors of this chiffonier hung laces, ribands, stockings, ladies' underclothing and an abdominal brace, which gave the impression that…

— Djuna Barnes

Yes, we who are full to the gorge with misery should look well around, doubting everything seen, done, spoken, precisely because we…

— Djuna Barnes

There's something evil in me that loves evil and degradation--purity's black backside! That loves honesty with a horrid love; or why have…

— Djuna Barnes

“I was doing well enough until you came along and kicked my stone over, and out I came, all moss and eyes.”

— Djuna Barnes

“He knew at the same time that this stricture of acceptance (by which what we must love is made into what we…

— Djuna Barnes