All my life I had feared imprisonment, the nun's cell, the hospital bed, the places where one faced the self without distraction, without the crutches of other people.

The vote means nothing to women. We should be armed.

It was the first time that I came face to face with madness and feared it and was fascinated by it.

There was I, devouring books and yet allowing a man who had never read a book to walk me home for a bit of harmless fumbling on the front steps.

When anyone asks me about the Irish character, I say look at the trees. Maimed, stark and misshapen, but ferociously tenacious.

Writers are always anxious, always on the run--from the telephone, from responsibilities, from the distractions of the world.

After that dark woman you search for someone who will fit into the irregular corners of your heart.