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.

Happy is the man who hath never known what it is to taste of fame—to have it is a purgatory, to want it is a hell!

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

We all have a contract with the public—in us they see themselves, or what they would like to be.

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

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

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

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.

Reality is always the foe of famous names.

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

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

Famous, adj. Conspicuously miserable.