“For my part, I believe I shall die an impenetrable secret, even if I should be subjected to the visits of newspaper reporters, desiring to describe my warts and my wens, and to take down my table and my literary talk.”

Asserting the irreducible complexity of the self against public curiosity and partial representations · Essay, A Literary Whim (Appleton’s Journal, 1871)

• Identity
• Privacy
• Self

“As I have not many good qualities of disposition I feel sure of this, which as many a member of my family have told me, makes me often hateful. My father said once he never saw any human being with such a talent for the disagreeable.”

Acknowledging a sharp, uncompromising temperament with wry self-knowledge · Letter to Elizabeth Akers Allen, December 1873

• Character
• Honesty
• Self Knowledge

“Recognition is the thing; for praise I labor as well as money.”

Valuing public acknowledgement above mere financial reward · Essay, A Literary Whim (Appleton’s Journal, 1871)

• Fame
• Recognition
• Writing