Each individual woman's body demands to be accepted on its own terms.

I can only tell you the kind of power I want, which is the power to persuade. But I do not want the power to tell other people what to do. Persuade assumes that the other person is going to make the decision. Especially as a writer and an activist, I want the power to put ideas and possibilities out there, but I understand that they will only work if they are freely chosen, so I don't want the power to dictate or to force the choice, ever.

We choose to be writers because we don't want to talk.

The young women seem to think that they can only go out with or marry a man who is superior to them. The problem there is that they are wanting to be defeated, as opposed to finding a partner.

There's no greater gift than thinking that you had some impact on the world, for the better.

People are quite clear in viewing nuns as the servants and the teachers and the supporters of the poor. You contrast that with the fact that the Vatican did virtually nothing about long-known pedophiles, and it's just too much.

Women tend to be conservative in youth and get more radical as they get older because they lose power with age. So, if a young woman is not a feminist, I say, just wait.