“My best friends have been nearly always stenographers, thieves, sailors, chauffeurs, shop-girls, lawyers, manicurists and humble students.”

Valuing companionship beyond fashionable literary society · Letter to Burton Rascoe, New York Tribune, 1922

• Friendship
• Society

“It is often healthy, relieving and searching to write a vicious satire, diatribe or philippic, despite the fact that one may be partly wrong.”

Defending fierce satire as a useful form of inquiry · Introduction to Giants and Dwarves, 1946

• Art
• Truth

“Great creators always have a few weaknesses in their main trends, and one of the attributes of greatness lies in its ability to overcome its own imperfections.”

Locating greatness in the struggle beyond artistic limitation · Introduction to Giants and Dwarves, 1946

• Art
• Hope