Oscar Wilde

Women are never disarmed by compliments. Men always are. That is the difference between the sexes.

All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling. To be natural is to be obvious, and to be obvious is to be inartistic.

How marriage ruins a man! It is as demoralizing as cigarettes, and far more expensive.

Crying is for plain women. Pretty women go shopping.

The only thing to do with good advice is to pass it on. It is never of any use to oneself.

Bosie has insisted on stopping here for sandwiches. He is quite like a narcissus -- so white and gold. I will come either Wednesday or Thursday night to your rooms. Send me a line. Bosie is so tired: he lies like a hyacinth on the sofa, and I worship him. (letter from Oscar Wilde, 1892 - quoted from Love in a dark time by Colm Toibin).

We can have in life but one great experience at best, and the secret of life is to reproduce that experience as often as possible.

I choose my friends for their good looks, my acquaintances for their good characters, and my enemies for their intellects. A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies.

I had a strange feeling that Fate had in store for me exquisite joys and exquisite sorrows.

Yet the roses are not less lovely for all that.

You like every one; that is to say, you are indifferent to every one.

The curves of your lips rewrite history.