Henry James Quotes - Page 2

Quotes about:

• Adjectives are the sugar of literature and adverbs the salt.

  Henry James

  Adjectives, Literature, Sugar

  Henry James (2016). “Henry James: Autobiographies: A Small Boy and Others / Notes of a Son and Brother / The Middle Years / Other Writings: Library of America #274”, p.1142, Library of America

  40 Copy quote

• There were several ways of understanding her: there was what she said, and there was what she meant, and there was something between the two, that was neither.

  Henry James

  Two, Understanding, Way

  Henry James (2015). “The Complete Novels of Henry James: The Portrait of a Lady + The Wings of the Dove + What Maisie Knew + The American + The Bostonian + The Ambassadors + Washington Square and more (Unabridged): Confidence + Roderick Hudson + The Awkward Age + The Europeans + The Golden Bowl + The Other House + The Outcry + The Princess Casamassima + The Reverberator + The Sacred Fount….”, p.1700, e-artnow

  41 Copy quote

• Don't try so much to form your character - it's like trying to pull open a tight, tender young rose. Live as you like best and your character will take care of itself.

  Henry James

  Character, Rose, Trying

  Henry James (2016). “Henry James: The Complete Novels [The Portrait of a Lady, The Ambassadors, The Golden Bowl, etc.] (Book House)”, p.988, Book House

  9 Copy quote

• Love has nothing to do with good reasons.

  Henry James

  Reason

  Henry James (2016). “Portrait of a Lady”, p.394, Henry James

  13 Copy quote

• Americans will eat garbage provided you sprinkle it liberally with ketchup.

  Henry James

  Food, Cooking, Sprinkles

  53 Copy quote

• In art economy is always beauty.

  Henry James

  Beauty, Art, Editing

  The Altar of the Dead preface (1909)

  10 Copy quote

• If one is strong, one loves the more strongly.

  Henry James

  Strong, One Love, Ifs

  9 Copy quote

• The main object of the novel is to represent life. . .The success of a work of art, to my mind, may be measured by the degree to which it produces a certain illusion; that illusion makes it appear to us for the time that we have lived another life - that we have had a miraculous enlargement of experience.

  Henry James

  Art, Mind, Degrees

  10 Copy quote

• She is like a revolving lighthouse; pitch darkness alternating with a dazzling brilliancy!

  Henry James

  Darkness, Lighthouse, Revolving

  Henry James (2016). “Henry James: The Complete Novels [The Portrait of a Lady, The Ambassadors, The Golden Bowl, etc.] (Book House)”, p.750, Book House

  37 Copy quote

• Things are always different than what they might be...If you wait for them to change, you will never do anything.

  Henry James

  Waiting, Different, Might

  7 Copy quote

• True happiness, we are told, consists in getting out of one's self; but the point is not only to get out - you must stay out; and to stay out you must have some absorbing errand.

  Henry James

  Happiness, Self, Inner Peace

  Henry James (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry James (Illustrated)”, p.159, Delphi Classics

  18 Copy quote

• I have in my own fashion learned the lesson that life is effort, unremittingly repeated.

  Henry James

  Fashion, Effort, Lessons

  Henry James, Leon Edel “Letters”, Harvard University Press

  8 Copy quote

• I call people rich when they're able to meet the requirements of their imagination.

  Henry James

  People, Imagination, Requirements

  Henry James (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry James (Illustrated)”, p.1417, Delphi Classics

  9 Copy quote

• Innocent and infinite are the pleasures of observation.

  Henry James

  Infinite, Innocent, Pleasure

  Henry James (2014). “Collected Stories 2”, p.155, Everyman's Library

  9 Copy quote

• if you are going to be pushed you had better jump

  Henry James

  Ifs

  Henry James (2015). “Washington Square (Unabridged): Satirical Novel from the famous author of the realism movement, known for Portrait of a Lady, The Ambassadors, The Princess Casamassima, The Bostonians, The American…”, p.106, e-artnow

  24 Copy quote

• Every good story is of course both a picture and an idea, and the more they are interfused the better.

  Henry James

  Ideas, Stories, Very Good

  Henry James, William Veeder, Susan M. Griffin (1986). “The Art of Criticism: Henry James on the Theory and the Practice of Fiction”, p.211, University of Chicago Press

  6 Copy quote

• To read between the lines was easier than to follow the text.

  Henry James

  Book, Reading, Read Between The Lines

  Henry James (2016). “Henry James: The Complete Novels [The Portrait of a Lady, The Ambassadors, The Golden Bowl, etc.] (Book House)”, p.928, Book House

  12 Copy quote

• There are two kinds of taste, the taste for emotions of surprise and the taste for emotions of recognition.

  Henry James

  Two, Taste, Recognition

  Henry James (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry James (Illustrated)”, p.12847, Delphi Classics

  16 Copy quote

• Make the short story tremendously succinct - with a very short pulse or rhythm - and the closest selection of detail - in other words summarise intensely and deeply and keep down the lateral development. It should be a little gem of bright, quick, vivid form

  Henry James

  Pulse, Details, Stories

  8 Copy quote

• To take what there is in life and use it, without waiting forever in vain for the preconceived, to dig deep into the actual and get something out of that; this, doubtless, is the right way to live.

  Henry James

  Inspirational, Life, Time

  Henry James, F. O. Matthiessen, Kenneth B. Murdock (1981). “The Notebooks of Henry James”, p.99, University of Chicago Press

  17 Copy quote

• A tradition is kept alive only by something being added to it.

  Henry James

  Alive, Tradition

  Henry James, James Edwin Miller (1972). “Theory of fiction: Henry James”

  13 Copy quote

• I am incapable of telling you not to feel. Feel, feel, I say - feel for all you're worth, and even if it half kills you, for that is the only way to live.

  Henry James

  Life, Way To Live, Half

  Henry James (1984). “Letters”, Belknap Press

  9 Copy quote

• The power to guess the unseen from the seen, to trace the implications of things, to judge the whole piece by the pattern . . . this cluster of gifts may almost be said to constitute experience.

  Henry James

  Judging, Unseen, Pieces

  Henry James (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry James (Illustrated)”, p.12972, Delphi Classics

  6 Copy quote

• Ideas are, in truth, forces. Infinite, too, is the power of personality. A union of the two always makes history.

  Henry James

  Character, Ideas, Two

  Henry James (1930). “Charles W. Eliot: President of Harvard University, 1869-1909”

  12 Copy quote

• Try to be one of the people on whom nothing is lost!

  Henry James

  Inspirational, People, Trying

  "The Art of Fiction" (1884)

  30 Copy quote

Page 2 of 11

First

← Prev

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Next →

• facebook
• twitter
• googleplus
• email
• linkedin