Jessie Burton

“What was once, is no longer.”

“Believe it or don't believe it, Madame. But my feet are tired too. Bloody tired. Like a dead man's.”

“That may be. But to decide that I was never going to live as a proper woman was not your choice to make.' 'What do you mean a proper woman?' 'A proper woman marries - she has children -' 'Then what does that make me? Am I not a proper woman? Last time I looked I certainly was.”

“There are horizons through the brickwork, you wait and see.”

“I felt nothing change in the room, except the shock of my voice alone and the peculiar euphoria one feels in the wake of applause, feeling at once cheapened and triumphant.”

“Like most artists, everything I produced was connected to who I was - and so I suffered according to how my work was received. The idea that anyone might be able to detach their personal value from their public output was revolutionary.”

“Marin believes love is better in the chase than caught,’ she says. He raises his eyebrows. ‘That does not surprise me. It is not better. But it is easier. One’s imagination is always more generous. And yet, the chase always tires you out in the end.”

“In suffering we find our truest selves.”

“A lifetime isn't enough to know how a person will behave.”

“This city is like no other city in the world. It is brilliant but it is bloated, and I've never called it home”

“A Depressive?' 'Smiles in ballrooms, weeps in bedrooms. Ill in her head.' Olive tapped her temple. 'And here.' She touched her heart.”

“I feel younger than eighteen but burdened as a eighty-year-old.”

“We're nothing more than prisoners to your desire.”

“I’m doing the absolute opposite of giving myself away. As far as I’m concerned, I’ll be completely visible. If the painting sells, I’ll be in Paris, hanging on a wall. If anything, I’m being selfish. It’s perfect; all the freedom of creation, with none of the fuss.”

“Love your children, for they are the seeds that will make this city bloom.”

“She had never had a friend like this, in her private room, combing her hair, listening to her, talking about silly nonsense and the uselessness of one's parents; how the future was perfect, because they hadn't lived it yet.”

“1887A lifetime isn't enough to know how a person will behave.”

“All we can do if we're lucky is stich up the mistakes other people make.”

“The ink was secret nectar, for Marin isn't married.”

“A piece of art only succeeds when it's creator...possesses the belief that brings it into being”