Quotes from Colette

i heard on their lips the language of passion, of betrayal and jealousy, and sometimes despair - languages with which I was all too familiar.

The word 'pure' has never revealed an intelligent meaning to me. I can only use the word to quench and optical thirst for purity in the transparencies that evoke it - in bubbles, in a volume of water, and in the imaginary latitudes entrenched, beyond reach, at the very center of a dense crystal.

The seventeenth of March. In other words, spring. Desmond, people who think themselves smart, I mean those in the height of fashion, women or men - can they afford to wait any longer before buying their spring wardrobes?

Tout m'est egalement odieux.

Live in the moment!

what an ennobling sadness you lent to my evening's enjoyment.

It can't drag on this way much longer," she said to herself. "One evening he'll whistle under my window, I'll go down by a ladder or a knotted rope and he will carry me away on a motorcycle, off to a den where his subjects will be assembled. He'll say: 'Here is your new Queen.' And... and... it will be terrible!" viii. Their Queen is away and anarchy reigns! The Journal said so! How grand to be Queen, with a red ribbon and a revolver...

At the top of the iron staircase leading to the stage, the good, dry, dusty warmth wraps me round like a comfortable dirty cloak.

Los compañeros perfectos no tienen menos de cuatro patas.

Her nature is like a demonstrative cat's; she is delicate, acutely sensitive to cold, and incredibly caressing in her ways.

The better we feel about ourselves, the fewer times we have to knock someone down to feel tall.

There is no doubt that, if ever my heart were to call my master Chance by another name, I should make an excellent Catholic.

She's a very mysterious creature, with an open smile and a closed soul.

Don't cudgel your brains over my little problems.

The more sensitive the lunatic, the less able is he to resist this prying interest of the normal human being. I felt that Renée's change of key - to myself, I compared Renée to a sweet melody, a little flat despite its laborious harmonies - was approaching.

Don't ever wear artistic jewelry; it wrecks a woman's reputation

We all go through that. Everyone's feeling a little out of sorts. No one knows exactly where he stands. Work is a wonderful way of putting you on your feet again, old boy

My son, be rich and live your own life! Tell yourself that you're the incarnation of an ancient aristocracy. Model yourself on the feudal barons. You're a warrior

Oh! To rationalize oneself into matrimony...Oh! To decide something so grave in life 'after mature consideration'! Choose the color of a dress after a thousand hesitations, but for God's sake, get married without reflecting on it! That's the grace I wish I wish for you. May you even be so distracted that day that you walk past the registry office without remembering to stop there.

Do I have a separate room? Don't I make love to you well?" She hesitated, smiling with exquisite suspicion. "Do you call that love, Fred?" "There are other words for it, but you wouldn't appreciate them.

Minne, pâle comme une nuit de lune, se réchauffe, un peu blessée, à ce feu de couleurs, et parfois, toute nue au soleil, un miroir à la main, cherche en vain, à travers son corps mince, l'ombre plus noire de son squelette élégant.

I have lived ten years of wild rovings, of conquests and discoveries, in those woods; the day when I have to leave them my heart will be very heavy.

Curious how people can go on doing the same thing day after day!

I was changing. Slowly, if you like, but what matter? To change is the great thing.