I write because in the act of creation there comes that mysterious, abundant sense of being both parent and child; I am giving birth to an Other and simultaneously being reborn as a child in the playground of creation.

All our parents have levels of deviousness. We're driven to write about this discrepancy between the bright shining selves they invented and the monsters lurking underneath.

Lovers, children, heroes, none of them do we fantasize as extravagantly as we fantasize our parents.

As to why people like Joseph Lelyveld are writing memoirs, I think they're just catching on the coattails of the trend.

I shall never cease to marvel at the way we beg for love and tyranny.

Mine [parents] started out more from scratch, because I'm constantly aware of what they suffered in the war.

Why are there no great women artists?' sounds as ignorant of human geography as the query 'Why are there no Eskimo tennis teams?