I don't feel like a survivor. I feel left behind.

I had a perfect confidence, still unshaken, in books. If you read enough you would reach the point of no return. You would cross over and arrive on the safe side. There you would drink the strong waters and become addicted, perhaps demented - but a Reader.

being asked to decide between your passion for work and your passion for children was like being asked by your doctor whether you preferred him to remove your brain or your heart.

poetry ... shows with a sudden intense clarity what is already there.

The poor South. Already guilty of slavery, it became guilty of cigarettes.

I always return to Paris, taking my selves along - past self, customary self, the self I never had.

I don't feel like a survivor. I feel left behind.