That heartbreaking moment when you finish an amazing book, and you are forced to return to reality.

In the park I met other women and I started to get interested in their lives. I developed a lot of pressure to talk about women's lives, and children's lives, too. Children interest me tremendously.

I've started many novels, and they all ended on page seven.

The wrong word is like a lie jammed inside the story.

You know the mind is an astonishing, long-living, erotic thing.

The only thing you should have to do is find work you love to do. And I can't imagine living without having loved a person. A man, in my case. It could be a woman, but whatever. I think, what I always tell kids when they get out of class and ask, 'What should I do now?' I always say, 'Keep a low overhead. You're not going to make a lot of money.' And the next thing I say: 'Don't live with a person who doesn't respect your work.' That's the most important thing—that's more important than the money thing. I think those two things are very valuable pieces of information.

I don't have any degrees. I went to Hunter College one year and New York University another year. It's just on the basis of my books that I've been hired at any of the places I've been.