Novels, since the birth of the genre, have been full of rejected, seduced, and abandoned maidens, whose proper fate is to die.

I used to be a reasonably careless and adventurous person before I had children; now I am morbidly obsessed by seat-belts and constantly afraid that low-flying aircraft will drop on my children's school.

The human mind can bear plenty of reality but not too much intermittent gloom.

Family life itself, that safest, most traditional, most approved of female choices, is not a sanctuary: It is, perpetually, a dangerous place.

What really annoys me are the ones who write to say, I am doing your book for my final examinations and could you please tell me what the meaning of it is. I find it just so staggering--that you're supposed to explain the meaning of your book to some total stranger! If I knew what the meanings of my books were, I wouldn't have bothered to write them.

Nothing succeeds, they say, like success. And certainly nothing fails like failure.

When nothing is sure, everything is possible.