A woman's work, from the time she gets up to the time she goes to bed, is as hard as a day at war, worse than a man's working day. ... To men, women's work was like the rain-bringing clouds, or the rain itself. The task involved was carried out every day as regularly as sleep. So men were happy - men in the Middle Ages, men at the time of the Revolution, and men in 1986: everything in the garden was lovely.

When you wept it was just over yourself and not because of the marvelous impossibility of reaching her through the difference that separates you.

To love one child and to love all children, whether living or dead -somewhere these two loves come together. To love a no-good but humble punk and to love an honest man who believes himself to be an honest man -somewhere these, too, come together.

She had lived her early years as though she were waiting for something she might, but never did, become.

Even so you have managed to live that love in the only way possible for you. Losing it before it happened.

It's only women who are not really quite women at all, frivolous women who have no idea, who neglect repairs.

It's afterwards you realize that the feeling of happiness you had with a man didn't necessarily prove that you loved him.