I've never given up. I've always kept going. I don't feel that I could afford to give up. That would be the beginning of the end.

Of the widow's countless death-duties there is really just one that matters: on the first anniversary of her husband's death the widow should think I kept myself alive.

Princeton is quite integrated. Women are professors at Princeton. Women are students at Princeton. That began in the 1970s.

Our enemy is by tradition our savior, in preventing us from superficiality.

Truths are the last thing you learn about your family. By the time you learn, you're no longer their child.

My writing is often a way of 'bearing witness' for others who lack the education and the opportunity to tell their own stories, so I hope that my writing won't be affected too much by my personal life.

I could EAT YOUR HEART & asshole you'd never know it.