There is nothing more boring for an intelligent woman than to spend endless amounts of time with small children.

Capable people do not understand incapacity; clever people do not understand stupidity.

I never stopped reading.

The great secret that all old people share is that you really haven't changed in seventy or eighty years. Your body changes, but you don't change at all. And that, of course, causes great confusion.

But children can't be a center of life and a reason for being. They can be a thousand things that are delightful, interesting, satisfying, but they can't be a well-spring to live from. Or they shouldn't be.

This world is run by people who know how to do things. They know how things work. They are equipped. Up there, there's a layer of people who run everything. But we - we're just peasants. We don't understand what's going on, and we can't do anything.

It is the mark of great people to treat trifles as trifles and important matters as important.