Katherine Mansfield Quotes

1888-1923, New Zealand-born British Author
quotes
16
topics
12
Origin
Topic
“I want to be all that I am capable of becoming.”
VerifiedEntry in her journal (10 October 1922) which she tore out to send to John Middleton Murry, before changing her mind. This later became the last published entry in The Journal of Katherine Mansfield (1927) ed. J. Middleton Murry · evidenceExcellence
“I love the rain. I want the feeling of it on my face.”
Weather
“Life never becomes a habit to me. It's always a marvel.”
Life and Living
“If only one could tell true love from false love as one can tell mushrooms from toadstools.”
Verified"Love and Mushrooms," journal entry (1917), published in More Extracts from a Journal, ed. J. Middleton Murry, in The Adelphi (1923), p. 1068 · evidenceLove
“The pleasure of all reading is doubled when one lives with another who shares the same books.”
VerifiedLetter to Ottoline Morrell (January 1922) · evidenceBooks and Reading
“Regret is an appalling waste of energy; you can't build on it; it's only good for wallowing in.”
Regret
“To work -- to work! It is such infinite delight to know that we still have the best things to do.”
VerifiedLetter to Bertrand Russell (7 December 1916), from The Collected Letters of Katherine Mansfield, vol. I · evidenceWork
“I want, by understanding myself, to understand others. I want to be all that I am capable of becoming.”
VerifiedEntry in her journal (10 October 1922) which she tore out to send to John Middleton Murry, before changing her mind. This later became the last published entry in The Journal of Katherine Mansfield (1927) ed. J. Middleton Murry · evidenceSelf-knowledge
“Everything in life that we really accept undergoes a change. So suffering must become Love. That is the mystery.”
Suffering
“I always felt that the great high privilege, relief and comfort of friendship was that one had to explain nothing.”
Friends and Friendship
“I'm treating you as a friend asking you to share my present minuses in the hope that I can ask you to share my future pluses”
Friends and Friendship
“Would you not like to try all sorts of lives -- one is so very small -- but that is the satisfaction of writing -- one can impersonate so many people.”
VerifiedLetter to Sylvia Payne (24 April 1906), from The Collected Letters of Katherine Mansfield (1984-1996), vol. I · evidenceFiction
“Risk! Risk anything! Care no more for the opinion of others, for those voices. Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for yourself. Face the truth.”
VerifiedJournal entry (14 October 1922), published in The Journal of Katherine Mansfield (1927) · evidenceRisk
“When we can begin to take our failures seriously, it means we are ceasing to be afraid of them. It is of immense importance to learn to laugh at ourselves.”
VerifiedJournal entry (October 1922), published in The Journal of Katherine Mansfield (1927) · evidenceFailure
“Make it a rule of life never to regret and never to look back. Regret is an appalling waste of energy; you can't build on it; it's only good for wallowing in.”
Regret
“It's a terrible thing to be alone -- yes it is -- it is -- but don't lower your mask until you have another mask prepared beneath --as terrible as you like --but a mask.”
VerifiedLetter to her future husband, John Middleton Murry (July 1917), from The Collected Letters of Katherine Mansfield, vol. I · evidenceLoneliness