[On sociability in Italy:] You may be a hermit or an innkeeper.
The fifties - they seem to have taken place on a sunny afternoon that asked nothing of you except a drifting belief in the moment and its power to satisfy.
Now, my novel begins. No, now I begin my novel—and yet I cannot decide whether to call myself I or she.
Self-love is an idolatry. Self-hatred is a tragedy.
Canadians, do not vomit on me!
It is June. This is what I have decided to do with my life just now. I will do this work and lead this life, the one I am leading today. Each morning the blue clock and the crocheted bedspread, the table with the Phone, the books and magazines, the Times at the door.