Where would we be without inhibitions? Theyre quite useful things when you look at some of the things humans do if they lose them.

Lists are a form of power.

You did not so much mind being -conventionally- betrayed, if you were not kept in the dark, which was humiliating, or defined only as a wife and dependent person, which was annihilating.

One does not remember the winners. One remains haunted by the losers.

Well, I would hardly say I do write as yet. But I write because I like words. I suppose if I liked stone I might carve. I like words. I like reading. I notice particular words. That sets me off.

A surprising number of people - including many students of literature - will tell you they haven't really lived in a book since they were children.

When I was a child - in wartime, pre-television - books were my life.