Things have changed, ofcourse. There are counsellors at the ready. Kindness and understanding. Life is harder for some, we're told. Not their fault, even if the blows are purely imgainery. Felt just as keenly by the recipient, or the non recipient, as the case may be. But good use can be made of everything, if you are willing.

A story ... has a sturdy sense of itself of being built out of its own necessity, not just to shelter or beguile you.

It’s just life. You can’t beat life.

I never have a problem with finding material. I wait for it to turn up, and it always turns up. It’s dealing with the material I’m inundated with that poses the problem.

Pots can show malice, the patterns of linoleum can leer up at you, treachery is the other side of dailiness.

Every year, when you're a child, you become a different person.

There were people whom you positively ached to please. If you failed with such people they would put you into a category in their minds where they could kee you and have contempt for you forever.