My mother was very involved with Cesar Chavez's work on behalf of the migrant farm workers in California.

To really love Joan Didion—to have been blown over by things like the smell of jasmine and the packing list she kept by her suitcase—you have to be female.

It can be demonstrated from history that no society has ever survived after its family life deteriorated.

Pubescent girls, it seems, are manifestly more likely to exhibit extreme and bizarre psychological symptoms than are teenage boys.

In many respects a teenage girl's home is more important to her than at any time since she was a small child. She also needs emotional support and protection from the most corrosive cultural forces that seek to exploit her when she is least able to resist.

My father was a writer; I've known a lot of children of writers - daughters and sons of writers, and it can be a hard way to grow up.

I used to teach at a private school, and the parents thought I loved their children. I did not love their children! I liked them well enough, but I was always delighted to see them go off for summer vacation.