Be bold, but not too bold. Have courage, but not too much.

What makes women happy? Nothing, for more than ten minutes at a time, so stop worrying.

Fiction, on the whole, and if it is any good, tends to be a subversive element in society.

Words are not simple things: they take unto themselves, as they have through time, power and meaning.

One friend dies and we remain indifferent; another dies, perhaps less intimate, and we see ourselves as dead, and weep, mourn, tear our hair or find ourselves caught up in the madness of the wake, competing with others as to who was closest, now suffers most.

I didn't even know I was a feminist until I read it on the back of one of my own books.

We shelter children for a time; we live side by side with men; and that is all. We owe them nothing, and are owed nothing. I think we owe our friends more, especially our female friends.