I have always found the times when another person recognizes you to be strangely sad; I suspect the pathos of these moments is their rareness, the way they contrast with most daily encounters. That reminder that it can be different, that you need not go through your life unknown but that you probably still will--that is the part that's almost unbearable.

She really does like him, she likes lying next to him, she wants to be around him; when you get down to it, can you say that about many people?

I wanted my life to start - but in those rare moments when it seemed like something might actually change, panic shot through me.

I gave people the benefit of the doubt, thinking, so many people that appear very calm and even boring must have all these wild emotions and crazy ideas.

She has always been a bystander in family destruction, never realizing she herself possessed the capacity to inflict it.

There are so many people who are so much better qualified to write about politics than I am.

I don't think that I would ever, while writing, think to myself, "I need a little more psychological realism."