All Edith Wharton Quotes
- Something he knew he had missed: the flower of life. But he thought of it now as a thing so unattainable and improbable that to… Been
- In every heart there should be one grief that is like a well in the desert. Desert
- ...and wondering where he had read that clever liars give details, but that the cleverest do not. Clever
- Selden and Lily stood still, accepting the unreality of the scene as a part of their own dream-like sensations. It would not have surprised them… Accepting
- It is less mortifying to believe one's self unpopular than insignificant, and vanity prefers to assume that indifference is a latent form of unfriendliness. Assume
- As he paid the hansom and followed his wife's long train into the house he took refuge in the comforting platitude that the first six… Adaptation
- ...It was one of the great livery-stableman's most masterly intuitions to have discovered that Americans want to get away from amusement even more quickly than… Americans
- Every house is a mad-house at some time or another. Every House
- Who's 'they'? Why don't you all get together and be 'they' yourselves? All
- How I hate everything! Hate
- ...though she had not had the strength to shake off the spell that bound her to him she had lost all spontaneity of feeling, and… All
- He bent and laid his lips on her hands, which were cold and lifeless. She drew them away, and he turned to the door, found… Belated
- Poetry and art are the breath of life to her. Art
- Archer was too intelligent to think that a young woman like Ellen Olenska would necessarily recoil from everything that reminded her of her past. She… Archer
- I believe I know the only cure, which is to make one’s center of life inside of one’s self, not selfishly or excludingly, but with… All
- Set wide the window. Let me drink the day. Action
- The taste of the usual was like cinders in his mouth, and there were moments when he felt as if he were being buried alive… Alive
- She felt a stealing sense of fatigue as she walked; the sparkle had died out of her, and the taste of life was stale on… Aware
- And all the while, I suppose," he thought, "real people were living somewhere, and real things happening to them ... All
- He had married (as most young men did) because he had met a perfectly charming girl at the moment when a series of rather aimless… Adventure
- The difference is that these young people take it for granted that they're going to get whatever they want, and that we almost always took… Advance
- She wanted, passionately and persistently, two things which she believed should subsist together in any well-ordered life: amusement and respectability. Amusement
- Everything about her was warm and soft and scented; even the stains of her grief became her as raindrops do the beaten rose. Beaten
- Little as she was addicted to solitude, there had come to be moments when it seemed a welcome escape from the empty noises of her… Addicted
- Half the trouble in life is caused by pretending there isn't any. Any