I have never been able to carry out any work coolly. On the contrary it is done, so to speak, with my own blood. Anyone who looks at my works must be able to sense that.

Recently I began reading my old diaries. Back to before the war. Gradually I became very depressed. The reason for that is probably that I wrote only when there were obstacles and halts to the flow of life, seldom when everything was smooth and even. ... As I read I distinctly felt what a half-truth a diary presents.

Men without joy seem like corpses.

Old ideas die hard. We've had thousands of years of women having almost no rights. Parts of the world are in a struggle toward very basic human rights for women, and most of the world isn't even there yet. And it's going to take a long time to change these attitudes.

I thought I was a revolutionary and was only an evolutionary.

I do not want to die... until I have faithfully made the most of my talent and cultivated the seed that was placed in me, until the last small twig has grown.

It seems to me nowadays that the most important task for someone who is aging is to spread love and warmth whenever possible.