Edith Wharton quotes

Each time you happen to me all over again.

— Spoken by a character · XXIX

It frightened him to think what must have gone to the making of her eyes.

I can't love you unless I give you up.

— Spoken by a character · XVIII

The real loneliness is living among all these kind people who only ask one to pretend!

— Spoken by a character · IX

Ah, good conversation--there's nothing like it, is there? The air of ideas is the only air worth breathing.

— Spoken by a character · XX

"We can't behave like people in novels, though, can we?"

— Spoken by a character · X

I swear I only want to hear about you, to know what you've been doing. It's a hundred years since we've met--it may be another hundred before we meet again.

— Spoken by a character · XXIII

His whole future seemed suddenly to be unrolled before him; and passing down its endless emptiness he saw the dwindling figure of a man to whom nothing was ever to happen.

And you'll sit beside me, and we'll look, not at visions, but at realities.

— Spoken by a character · XXIX

"I want--I want somehow to get away with you into a world where words like that--categories like that--won't exist. Where we shall be simply two human beings who love each other, who are the whole of life to each other; and nothing else on earth will matter."

— Spoken by a character · XXIX

Oh——” Miss Bart protested, drawing back from her penitent clasp; but Mrs. Fisher went on with her usual directness: “Look here, Lily, don’t let’s beat about the bush: half the trouble in life is caused by pretending there isn’t any.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter 5

“Do you remember what you said to me once? That you could help me only by loving me? Well—you did love me for a moment; and it helped me. It has always helped me. But the moment is gone—it was I who let it go. And one must go on living. Goodbye.”

— Spoken by a character · Chapter 12

She was so evidently the victim of the civilization which had produced her, that the links of her bracelet seemed like manacles chaining her to her fate.

Why do we call all our generous ideas illusions, and the mean ones truths?

— Selden · Chapter 6

Her husband’s faith in her had made her renewal possible—it is so easy for a woman to become what the man she loves believes her to be!

She had no tolerance for scenes which were not of her own making, and it was odious to her that her husband should make a show of himself before the servants.

The real alchemy consists in being able to turn gold back again into something else; and that’s the secret that most of your friends have lost.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter 6

No insect hangs its nest on threads as frail as those which will sustain the weight of human vanity; and the sense of being of importance among the insignificant was enough to restore to Miss Bart the gratifying consciousness of power.

We are expected to be pretty and well-dressed till we drop—and if we can’t keep it up alone, we have to go into partnership.

— Spoken by a character · Chapter 1

Her whole being dilated in an atmosphere of luxury; it was the background she required, the only climate she could breathe in.

That was all; but all their intercourse had been made up of just such inarticulate flashes, when they seemed to come suddenly upon happiness as if they had surprised a butterfly in the winter woods....

I want to put my hand out and touch you. I want to do for you and care for you. I want to be there when you’re sick and when you’re lonesome.

— Spoken by a character · IX

She pronounced the word married as if her voice caressed it. It seemed a rustling covert leading to enchanted glades.