Live Alone and Like It Quotes

“Be a Communist, a stamp collector, or a Ladies’ Aid worker if you must, but for heaven’s sake, be something.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“... not talking about things she doesn't understand to people who do or about things she does to people who don't.”
― Frank Crowninshield, Live Alone and Like It

“One of the great advantages of your way of living is that you CAN be alone when you want to. Lots of people never discover what a pleasure this can be. Perhaps it was because of its possibilities that the misused expression 'enjoy yourself' came into being. The more you enjoy YOURSELF, the more of a person you are.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“Your setting, if you live alone, matters much more than if you had a husband or even a lover. And your standards of living should be about ten points higher than if you lived with somebody else. The woman who treats herself like an aristocrat seems aristocratic to other people, and the woman who is sloppy at home inevitably slips sometime in public.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“...the perfect hostess is, after all, not so much the one who is good at talking as the one who is good at making her guests talk.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“Tómate los cosméticos en serio. Olvídate de tu antigua y conocida crema, busca las cremas correctas, el peinado ideal, la mejor manicura y todos los demás trucos de belleza que te hagan sentir elegante. Estas son las formas de consentirse que realmente valen la pena.”
― Marjorie Hillis, El placer de vivir sola

“Question: Is it permissible for a youngish un-chaperoned woman living alone to wear pajamas when a gentleman calls? Answer: Assuming that she knows one pajama from another, it is entirely permissible. There are, however, sleeping pajamas, beach pajamas, lounging pajamas, and hostess pajamas.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It: The Classic Guide for the Single Woman

“It is all very well to be highbrow, but anyone who thinks that this means having a mind above meals is not quite bright. There is probably nothing that gives as much pleasure as food, not excepting love. Dull food, poor food, and badly served food can undermine your morals, while interesting food can make life seem very pleasant after all.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“Certainly, affairs should not even be thought of before you are thirty. Once you have reached this age, if you will not hurt any third person and can take all that you will have to take - take it silently, with dignity, with a little humor, and without any weeping or wailing or gnashing of teeth - perhaps the experience will be worth it to you. Or perhaps not.

The sad truth is that whatever you decide, you'll think you regret it. You'll hate the shabby end of romance, and you'll detest missing it altogether.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“We would also like to say a few words about your bedroom wardrobe. This is no place to be grim and practical. Don't worry about whether your nightgowns will wear if you are sure that they will flatter. We can think of nothing more depressing than going to bed in a washed-out four-year-old nightgown, nothing more bolstering to the morale than going to bed all fragrant with toilet-water and wearing a luscious pink satin nightgown, well-cut and trailing.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“We are all for as much glamour as possible in the bedroom. The single bedroom, as well as the double one. If even the most respectable spinsters would regard their bedrooms as places where anything might happen, the resulting effects would be extremely beneficial.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“The best parties (we are not referring to Beaux Arts Balls or liquor marathons, but to parties of four to perhaps eight) are not trick affairs. They consist chiefly of guests and food that mix well and drinks that are well mixed.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“Case V: Miss J - This is the sad story of a young woman who sees herself as a martyr and has never noticed that however appealing the role may be to the player, it is a terrible bore to everyone else.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“Do go in for cosmetics in a serious way. Not any old cream, but the right creams. The right coiffure too, and the right nail polish, and all the other beauty tricks that make you feel elegant. This is the kind of pampering that pays.

There are other good kinds: a glass of sherry and an extra special dinner charmingly served on a night when you're tired and all alone; bath salts in your tub and toilet-water afterward; a new and spicy book when you're spending an evening in bed; a trim little cotton frock that flatters you on an odd morning when you decide to be violently domestic. The notion that 'it doesn't matter because nobody sees you', with the dull meals and dispirited clothes that follow in its wake, has done more damage than all the floods of springtime.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“You have probably noticed that the lady of your acquaintance who thinks of herself as a duchess may cause a good many laughs, but usually, in the main, is treated like a duchess - in so far, at least, as her friends know how a duchess should be treated.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It

“Everybody feels sorry for herself (to say nothing of himself) now and then. But anyone who pities herself for more than a month on end is a weak sister and likely to become a public nuisance besides.”
― Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It