W. Somerset Maugham, The Razor's Edge
7 quotes
"When he sacrifices himself man for a moment is greater than God, for how can God, infinite and omnipotent, sacrifice himself?"
"The man I am writing about is not famous. It may be that he never will be. It may be that when his life at last comes to an end he will leave no more trace of his sojourn on earth than a stone thrown into a river leaves on the surface of the water."
"Well, you know when people are no good at anything else they become writers."
"Larry has been absorbed, as he wished, into that tumultuous conglomeration of humanity, distracted by so many conflicting interests, so lost in the world's confusion, so wistful of good, so cocksure on the outside, so diffident within, so kind, so hard, so trustful and so cagey, so mean and so generous, which is the people of the United States."
"I thought with melancholy how an author spends months writing a book, and maybe puts his heart’s blood into it, and then it lies about unread till the reader has nothing else in the world to do."
"I only wanted to suggest to you that self-sacrifice is a passion so overwhelming that beside it even lust and hunger are trifling."
"A mother only does her children harm if she makes them the only concern of her life."