Charm is an odorless perfume, which cannot be anchored in the chemists' test tube. It is a permeation, a radiation. It emanates from the climate of a warm human spirit, which not only contains light, but gives it off.

writing is the loneliest job in the world. There's always that frustrating chasm to bridge between the concept and the writing of it. We're a harassed tribe, we writers.

It takes a clever man to turn cynic and a wise man to be clever enough not to.

Oh - oh, why is it that the members of a family feel privileged to treat one another with a cruelty they would not exhibit to the merest stranger?

I'm not happy when I'm writing, but I'm more unhappy when I'm not.

Luscious feet that listened to the soil and stole its secrets.

A woman is not a whole woman without the experience of marriage. In the case of a bad marriage, you win if you lose. Of the two alternatives - bad marriage or none - I believe bad marriage would be better. It is a bitter experience and a high price to pay for fulfillment, but it is the better alternative.