She is very plain. What does Henry see in her?'" "He thinks she's stupid. He finds it restful.

People will identify with a persecuted minority without asking themselves what they are identifying with.

If you get stuck, get away from your desk. Take a walk, take a bath, go to sleep, make a pie, draw, listen to music, meditate, exercise; whatever you do, don't just stick there scowling at the problem. But don't make telephone calls or go to a party; if you do, other people's words will pour in where your lost words should be.

I'm one of these children who grew up at the knee of my grandmother and her elder sister, listening to very old people talk about their memories.

For myself, the only way I know how to make a book is to construct it like a collage: a bit of dialogue here, a scrap of narrative, an isolated description of a common object, an elaborate running metaphor which threads between the sequences and holds different narrative lines together.

[Margaret] Thatcher could fake her class background, but she couldn't fake the quality of her mind.

Fear of commitment lies behind the fear of writing.