W. Somerset Maugham on Love

"He did not care if she was heartless, vicious and vulgar, stupid and grasping, he loved her. He would rather have misery with one than happiness with the other."

"The great tragedy of life is not that men perish, but that they cease to love."

"As lovers, the difference between men and women is that women can love all day long, but men only at times."

"If a man hasn't what's necessary to make a woman love him, it's his fault, not hers."

"Few misfortunes can befall a boy which bring worse consequences than to have a really affectionate mother."

"But when all was said the important thing was to love rather than to be loved."

"I did not then know the besetting sin of woman, the passion to discuss her private affairs with anyone who is willing to listen."

"The love that lasts longest is the love that is never returned."

"But who can fathom the subtleties of the human heart? Certainly not those who expect from it only decorous sentiments and normal emotions."

"We are not the same persons this year as last ; nor are those we love. It is a happy chance if we, changing, continue to love a changed person."

"I'll give you my opinion of the human race in a nutshell... their heart's in the right place, but their head is a thoroughly inefficient organ."

"He had a bitter pain in his heart, for he knew that she was still a stranger to him and his hungry love was destined ever to remain unsatisfied."

"What mean and cruel things men can do for the love of God."

"When a woman loves you she's not satisfied until she possesses your soul. Because she's weak, she has a rage for domination, and nothing less will satisfy her."

"Oh, it's always the same,' she sighed, 'if you want men to behave well to you, you must be beastly to them; if you treat them decently they make you suffer for it."

"There's always one who loves and one who lets himself be loved."

"When you have loved as she has loved, you grow old beautifully."

"Passion doesn't count the cost. ... Passion is destructive."

"It was such a lovely day I thought it was a pity to get up."

"He loved her so passionately he wanted her to be one soul and one body with him; and he was conscious that here, with those deep roots attaching her to the native life, she would always keep something from him."

"Both these men are in love with Natasha, Count Rostov's younger daughter, and in her Tolstoy has created the most delightful girl in fiction. Nothing is so difficult as to portray a young girl who is at once charming and interesting. Generally the young girls of fiction are colorless , priggish , too clever by half , or little geese , silly flirts or innocent beyound belief. It is understandable that they should be an awkward subject for the novelist to deal with, for at that tender age the personality is undeveloped. Similarly a painter can only make a face interesting when the vicissitudes of life, thought, love and suffering have given it character. In the portrait of a girl the best he can do is to represent the charm and beauty of youth. But Natasha is entirely natural. She is sweet, sensitive, and sympathetic, willful, childish, womanly already, idealistic, quick-tempered, warm-hearted, headstrong, capricious and in everything enchanting. Tolstoy created many women and they are wonderfully true to life, but never another who wins the affection of the reader as does Natasha."