“I am vain—praise is opium, and the lip
Cannot resist the fascinating draught,
Though knowing its excitement is a fraud—
Delirious—a mockery of fame.”
A History of the Lyre
The Venetian Bracelet (1829)
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Letitia Elizabeth Landon 785
English poet and novelist 1802–1838Related quotes
“There are words which a man cannot resist from a woman, even though he knows them to be false.”
Is He Popenjoy? (1878), Ch. 18
“Those who are actuated by the desire of fame and glory are amazingly gratified by approbation and praise, even though it comes from their inferiors.”
Omnes enim, qui gloria famaque ducuntur, mirum in modum assensio et laus a minoribus etiam profecta delectat.
Letter 12, 6.
Letters, Book IV
“It is vain to apportion praise and blame.”
The Second Sex (1949)
Context: It is vain to apportion praise and blame. The truth is that if the vicious circle is so hard to break, it is because the two sexes are each the victim at once of the other and of itself. Between two adversaries confronting each other in their pure liberty, an agreement could be easily reached: the more so as the war profits neither. But the complexity of the whole affair derives from the fact that each camp is giving aid and comfort to the enemy; woman is pursuing a dream of submission, man a dream of identification. Want of authenticity does not pay: each blames the other for the unhappiness he or she has incurred in yielding to the temptations of the easy way; what man and woman loathe in each other is the shattering frustration of each one's own bad faith and baseness.
Source: Odd Thomas (2003), Chapter 1; Odd Thomas's introduction
