And now she was back in the world, not one she could make, but the one that had made her, and she felt herself shrinking under the early evening sky. She was weary of being outdoors, but she was not ready to go in. Was that really all there was in life, indoors or out? Wasn't there somewhere else for people to go?

Wasn't writing a kind of soaring, an achievable form of flight, of fancy, of the imagination?

How can a novelist achieve atonement when, with her absolute power of deciding outcomes, she is also God?

It is quite impossible these days to assume anything about people's educational level from the way they talk or dress or from their taste in music. Safest to treat everyone you meet as a distinguished intellectual.

The evasions of her little novel were exactly those of her life. Everything she did not wish to confront was also missing from her novella--and was necessary to it.

I've never had a moment's doubt. I love you. I believe in you completely. You are my dearest one. My reason for life.

If life was a dream, then dying must be the moment when you woke up. It was so simple it must be true. You died, the dream was over, you woke up. That's what people meant when they talked about going to heaven. It was like waking up.