Most authors seek fame, but I seek for justice—a holier impulse than ever entered into the ambitious struggles of the votaries of that fickle, flirting goddess.

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

Famous, adj. Conspicuously miserable.

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

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.

Fame will go by and, so long, I’ve had you, fame. If it goes by, I’ve always known it was fickle. So at least it’s something I experienced, but that’s not where I live.

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.

Those who know the joys and miseries of celebrities when they have passed the age of forty know how to defend themselves.

I’m afraid of losing my obscurity. Genuineness only thrives in the dark. Like celery.

When I do a show, the whole show revolves around me, and if I don’t show up, they can just forget it.

Men are generally more pleased with a widespread than with a great reputation.

Being a star has made it possible for me to get insulted in places where the average Negro could never hope to go and get insulted.

Wood burns because it has the proper stuff in it, and a man becomes famous because he has the proper stuff in him.