The individual appears for an instant, joins the community of thought, modifies it and dies; but the species, that dies not, reaps the fruit of his ephemeral existence.

I think vestigially there's a synesthete in me but not like a real one who immediately knows what colour Wednesday is.

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

Novels arise out of the shortcomings of History.

As a little girl, I didn't like stories about little girls. I liked stories about dragons and beasts and princes and princesses and fear and terror and the Four Musketeers and almost anything other than nice little girls making moral decisions about whether to tell the teacher about what the other little girl did or did not do.

I'd like to write the way Matisse paints.

Narration is as much a part of human nature as breath and the circulation of the blood.