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One must not look inward too much, while the inside is yet tender. I do not wish to frighten myself until I can stand it.

Djuna Barnes

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Djuna Barnes
Age: 90 †
Born: 1892
Born: June 12
Died: 1982
Died: June 18
Journalist
Novelist
Playwright
Poet
Writer
Cornwall on Hudson
New York
Lydia Steptoe
Stand
Wish
Look
Looks
Frighten
Must
Tender
Much
Conformity
Inward
Inside

More quotes by Djuna Barnes

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Only the impossible lasts forever.
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When autumn shadows throw their patterns across the land, they are not the images of fragile, dying leaves, not the bared arms of lofty elms, not shadows of a fading summer but swinging shapes as of books upon a strap, of round and square boxes held under an arm, of hurrying little people heading towards the nearest school.
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To love without criticism is to be betrayed.
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Life is painful, nasty and short.. in my case it has only been painful and nasty.
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New York is the meeting place of the peoples, the only city where you can hardly find a typical American.
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Love is the first lie wisdom the last.
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A man's sorrow runs uphill true it is difficult for him to bear, but it is also difficult for him to keep.
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I couldn't ever boil potatoes over the heat of your affection. Your love would never bridge a gap it wouldn't even fill up the hole that the mice came through.
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The very condition of Woman is so subject to Hazard, so complex, and so grievous, that to place her at one moment is but to displace her at the next.
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Man is the only thing that has no further use after something goes amiss.
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The priceless galaxy of misinformation called the mind.
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We are beginning to wonder whether a servant girl hasn't the best of it after all. She knows how the salad tastes without the dressing, and she knows how life's lived before it gets to the parlor door.
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And must I, perchance, like careful writers, guard myself against the conclusions of my readers?
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We are but skin about a wind, with muscles clenched against mortality.
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I have been loved,' she said, 'by something strange, and it has forgotten me.
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Youth is cause, effect is age so with the thickening of the neck we get data.
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I'm a fart in a gale of wind, a humble violet under a cow pat.
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I have a narrative, but you will be put to it to find it.
Djuna Barnes
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Our bones ache only while the flesh is on them.
Djuna Barnes
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What is a ruin but time easing itself of endurance?
Djuna Barnes