Elsa Maxwell

I don't hate anyone. I dislike. But my dislike is the equivalent of anyone else's hate.

— Elsa Maxwell

Fight fire with fire. If you must have bores, always put them together or at the same table ... bores have an…

— Elsa Maxwell

Serve the dinner backward, do anything - but for goodness sake, do something weird.

— Elsa Maxwell

Giving parties is a trivial avocation, but it pays the dues for my union card in humanity.

— Elsa Maxwell

People who have escaped from poverty are like old soldiers. In later years they recount the little, amusing incidents that happened infrequently,…

— Elsa Maxwell

Seeing unhappiness in the marriage of friends, I was content to have chosen music and laughter as a substitute for a husband.

— Elsa Maxwell

Good manners - the longer I live the more convinced I am of it - are a priceless insurance against failure and…

— Elsa Maxwell

don't try for wit. Settle for humor. You'll last longer.

— Elsa Maxwell

Protocol may be defined as the code of etiquette which protects royalty from the competition of intellectual and social superiors.

— Elsa Maxwell

Keep your talent in the dark and you'll never be insulted.

— Elsa Maxwell

A bore is a vacuum cleaner of society, sucking up everything and giving nothing. Bores are always eager to be seen talking…

— Elsa Maxwell

Someone said that life is a party. You join in after it's started and leave before it's finished.

— Elsa Maxwell

the wealthy ... live in marble mausoleums surrounded by the suspicions and neuroses that have replaced the medieval moats which once isolated…

— Elsa Maxwell

Existence is a party. You join after its started and you leave before its finished.

— Elsa Maxwell

The loudest psalm singer in the congregation always is a reformed sinner.

— Elsa Maxwell

Good manners spring from just one thing - kind impulses.

— Elsa Maxwell

Nothing spoils a good party like a genius.

— Elsa Maxwell

The secret of my success is that no woman has ever been jealous of me.

— Elsa Maxwell

Only those who have earned leisure know how to use it profitably.

— Elsa Maxwell

I make enemies deliberately. They are the sauce piquante to my dish of life.

— Elsa Maxwell

[On the British Museum:] It was manifestly impossible to read all the books in that huge, gloomy structure, but I made a…

— Elsa Maxwell

Anatomize the character of a successful hostess and the knife will lay bare the fact that she owes her position to one…

— Elsa Maxwell

Bores put you in a mental cemetery while you are still walking.

— Elsa Maxwell

[On Hollywood:] I had gone there expecting to see parties that reflected the stock-in-trade of the movies - glamour. Instead, I found…

— Elsa Maxwell

What is a bore? Maxwell definition: a vacuum cleaner of society, sucking up everything and giving nothing. How do you spot one?…

— Elsa Maxwell