I think writing is a process that starts long before the writers are actually writers and probably goes on long afterward. It's rather like the way the Arabs weave rugs. They don't stop. They just cut them off at a certain spot on the loom. There is no particular beginning or end.
Jeanette WintersonEven death after a long illness is without warning. The moment you had prepared for so carefully took you by storm. The troops broke through the window and snatched the body and the body is gone. ... Death reduces us to the baffled logic of a small child. If yesterday why not today?
Jeanette WintersonShe hated being a nobody and like all children, adopted or not, I have had to live out some of her unlived life. We do that for our parents - we don't really have any choice.
Jeanette WintersonA character has a distinctive voice - you should be able to hear them in your head and conduct a conversation with them while you're out walking. If the answers surprise you, you know it's the character speaking and not you.
Jeanette Winterson