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

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

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!

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 is but the empty noise of madmen.

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