Women in America read 'lifestyle' pages which are really glorifications of shopping. They teach us we must veil ourselves in make-up to be loved. And we willingly take the veil, thinking ourselves freed by it. Make-up is no more optional for us than the veil is for Arab women: it is our Western version of the chador.

It takes a spasm of love to write a poem.

Allow me to put the record straight. I am forty-six and have been for some years past.

What was the point of spending your life with someone you were always looking for ways to decieve?

Friends love misery... our misery is what endears us to our friends.

The trick is not how much pain you feel--but how much joy you feel. Any idiot can feel pain. Life is full of excuses to feel pain, excuses not to live, excuses, excuses, excuses.

My generation of young female writers discovered that we could dictate the form and content of our own fiction.