When I became a feminist, when the movement started in the late sixties, I started writing because I had something urgent to say. My first novel, Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen, is the product of that urgency.

My mirror image always had to be interpreted. And for that I sought my reflection in someone else's eyes.

Within walking distance of any spot on Earth there's probably more than enough mystery to investigate in a lifetime.

Everything is connected. There is no such thing as an island, especially in our world, global village, the whole thing. Pollution from way across the ocean circulates in the air.

One important part of historical recording is to get people of another generation to understand the feelings, the passion that went into social transformation. That's why oral history is so valuable.

I am a feminist. I'm trying to show the relationships between men and women, always the structural relations, not individual villains. I'd never make a husband a villain. I try very hard in my work not to - because if I made one man a villain, the rest would be off the hook. I'm interested in the system of oppression.

For many decades my relations with my parents constituted unfinished business. I had dealt with them through sheer avoidance and guilt.