I've been astonished how often, when I convince a writer to tell a story more straightforwardly and to tell it more simply and directly, it turns out that this author is great and the story is wonderful.

Teaching is very important to me, and it has become more important as I get older.

Certainly children are being encouraged far more than they were seventy-five years ago and are more accepted as they are.

I think that inevitably, the trouble our characters go through is a kind of metaphor for what's happening in ourselves.

When an editor first explained to me the difference between direct and indirect writing, I just thought it was a stylistic choice.

Maybe we're stuck with who we are.

I remember I had had one woman who had three or four kids, and some of them were having problems. I said, 'Maybe you could go write somewhere else, away from your house.' And sure enough, all kinds of wonderful stuff emerged. She was keeping too much charge of herself because she couldn't stop being a mother when she was in the house. You have to find your own way of letting loose, if you're one of those people.