I think my role is as a writer, especially, and then also as a speaker, an organizer, and an entre- preneur of social change. My role isn't to make choices for people-each individual or group needs to do that on their own. But as a writer and a speaker, you can describe possibilities that perhaps haven't been visible before, and aren't in other public dialogues or in the rest of the media. So I suppose I think of myself mainly as an organizer and as someone who describes possibilities.

Men should think twice before making widow hood woman's only path to power.

It's a big gift to be recognizable as part of something that matters to people, but that's not the same as being responsible for something.

The origins of violence against women by men are not biological. If that were the case, it would exist in every culture. And it doesn't exist in every culture.

Happy or Unhappy, families are all mysterious.

Writing is the only thing that, when I do it, I don't feel I should be doing something else.

We all know as we travel around this country or around the world that there are huge problems, and also people doing amazing things on the ground - but those people rarely get reported. Our media are so into conflict that they sometimes say to me, "Bring an 'anti' with you."