You know, there's something heartsick about parties like this. Look at us. We're all pretending to be smart, as if intelligence were the cure for our anguish.

There is such a thing as the poetry of a mistake, and when you say, "Mistakes were made," you deprive an action of its poetry, and you sound like a weasel.

Literature is not an instruction manual.

As my mother once said to me, ‘They’re quite crazy, dear – men are. What you look for is one of them whose insanity is large enough, and calm and generous enough, to include you.

I don't think that most women have to prove that they're real women. You live long enough, you graduate to being real.

The worst mistakes I've made have been the ones directed by sweet-natured hopefulness.

Try to get your characters into interesting trouble. Allow your characters to misbehave. Let them stay out after 11.