"Imagine an immense plain.. ..in the middle, a small Gothic chapel surrounded by trees.. ..around that a hundred tents…"

"They [the holiday-visitors near Le Havre] love my little ladies [paintings] on the beach, and some people say that th…"

"I shall do other things, but I will always be the painter of beaches."

"I have a confession to make. When I came back to.. ..the beach at Trouville.. ..it seeemed nothing more than than a f…"

"The peasants have their painters, Millet, Jaque, Breton; and that is a good thing.. ..Well and good: but between you …"

"I dare not think of the sun-drenched beaches and the stormy skies, and of the joy of painting them in the sea breezes."

"When I got back [from Le Havre], where I had made several sketches of the harbour exit, I thought of placing the sun …"

"I exhaust myself terribly to content the world, and never manage to content myself."

"I am obsessed with the idea of leaving. I must travel, for that would probably relax me."

"To swim in the open sky. To achieve the tenderness of clouds. To suspend these masses in the distance, very far away …"