Avoid the talk of men. For talk is mischievous, light, and easily raised, but hard to bear and difficult to be rid of. Talk never wholly dies away when many people voice her: even talk is in some ways divine.

They are trying to make me into a fixed star. I am an irregular planet.

I would much rather have men ask why I have no statue than why I have one.

Fame is no sanctuary from the passing of youth. Suicide is much easier and more acceptable in Hollywood than growing old gracefully.

Worldly fame is but a breath of wind that blows now this way, now that, and changes names as it changes in direction.

I am sick and tired of publicity. I want no more of it. It puts me in a bad light. I just want to be forgotten.

What is popularly called fame is nothing but an empty name and a legacy from paganism.

How sweet it is to have people point and say, “There he is.”

If fame is only to come after death, I am in no hurry for it.

I won’t be happy till I’m as famous as God.

Possessions, outward success, publicity, luxury—to me these have always been contemptible. I believe that a simple and unassuming manner of life is best for everyone, best both for the body and the mind.

There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.

Now there is fame! Of all—hunger, misery, the incomprehension by the public—fame is by far the worst. It is the castigation by God of the artist. It is sad. It is true.