In a novel there's not much autobiography. There are characters in transit. Naturally, I can project something of my experiences onto the characters, but they have their own autonomy, a personality that is often a mystery to me.

The waves have the habit of going forward and then flowing back.

A woman has to demonstrate in every moment to be thirty times better than a man, to gain trust and to be considered. So, she has to be tenacious, combattative but not aggressive, she has to love her work a lot and not let herself be discouraged by the daily discriminiation she encounters.

To leave a book is like leaving the better part of oneself.

Falling in love with a story is like falling in love with a person. It tends to occupy your life, your thoughts. You can't do anything else for a long time.

Success is something you should never take into consideration: if you follow it it'll elude you. It's important to really love your work as a writer, to read loads to the point where you can recognise blindfolded, hearing them read, the writers of yesterday and today. It's important to write every day, for hours. To have faith in your imagination and let it wander.

A painter's hand has a thirst for thieving, it steals from heaven and makes a gift to the memories of men, it feigns eternity and it delights in this pretence almost as if it had created rules of its own, more durable and more profoundly true.