Actually, I'm looking forward to being 50. Because to me, that's when a woman is at the pinnacle of her femininity and her womanhood.

I spent my teenage years in Paris when my dad was stationed there, and I'd look at women in their forties and think, 'That's the age I want to be.'

My own parents were very un-neurotic, so I never thought that I had to change enormously in order to become a parent.

People who are exceptionally intelligent are often lonely because there are few people as intelligent as them. I have two little children and everyone says: 'I hope they're doing well in school. I hope they're bright.' And I think: why would anyone want their children to be the brightest? Academia is a lonely world.

I think change is good because it teaches you that it's nothing to be frightened of.

I was lucky to learn early in life that you need money for food and shelter, but there's no ambition in having money in the bank for the sake of it!

America is such a nation of suppressed emotion, and when you arrive in L.A., you can smell the fear. It's the most alien country I've ever been to.