And why do I always live only in memory?" Notable passage: "The machine was running on empty, racing, turning out a fortune without producing an iota of delight: no one enjoyed themselves in the least in these clubs, and I started to doubt whether anyone ever had".
Although these small delights usually appear to be of no particular value - a scrapped receipt perhaps or a post-it note with an illegible scribble - they can sometimes hold an incredibly significant sentiment.
As Dr. Johnson wrote, "a man accustomed to hear only the echo of his own sentiments, soon bars all the common avenues of delight, and has no part in the general gratification of mankind".
Presents (as distinct from gifts, which I was always told are God's to dispose) can be a delight, of course; I yield to no one in the degree of irrational delight I experience at the sight of a parcel wrapped with a bow.
Ever since it was announced last February that Harper Lee was to publish a sequel to her famed and much-loved To Kill a Mockingbird, fans reacted with a mixture of delight, confusion and no little anxiety.
And so it seems to delight her no end that much of an installation that she will present in her inaugural exhibition at the new Upper East Side outpost of the gallery Hauser & Wirth on Tuesday cannot be reproduced legibly in a family newspaper, and, in fact, takes a little delicacy even to describe in such a newspaper.
Before Davis could answer, Wilpon interjected with a firm "No," to the delight of the others in attendance.
The following day a notoriously homophobic tabloid ran the story, to the delight, no doubt, of many straight women living a life of drudgery.
"There is no substitute for the delight of writing," he wrote to a friend.
While these were once the delight of a fledgling web industry, they are no longer useful.
