Intimacies between women often go backwards, beginning in revelations and ending in small talk.

One can suffer a convulsion of one's entire nature, and, unless it makes some noise, no one notices. It's not just that we are incurious; we completely lack any sense of each other's existences.

Story involves action. Action towards an end not to be foreseen (by the reader) but also towards an end which, having been reached, must be seen to have been from the start inevitable.

... in nine out of ten cases the original wish to write is the wish to make oneself felt[ellipsis in source] the non-essential writer never gets past that wish.

In 'real life' everything is diluted; in the novel everything is condensed.

Education is not so important as people think.

Jealousy is no more than feeling alone against smiling enemies.