What was it to love someone, what was love exactly, and why did it end or not end? Those were the real questions, and who could answer them?

That wasn't a bad price for a first book. My agent upped it as much as possible. I was 27 and had nothing behind me. I was working like a fool to earn a living and pay for my apartment

I have Graham Greene's telephone number, but I wouldn't dream of using it. I don't seek out writers because we all want to be alone.

one blow in anger [would] kill, probably, a child from aged two to eight. Those over eight would take two blows to kill.

January. It was all things. And it was one thing, like a solid door. Its cold sealed the city in a gray capsule. January was moments, and January was a year. January rained the moments down, and froze them in her memory: [...]Every human action seemed to yield a magic. January was a two-faced month, jangling like jester's bells, crackling like snow crust, pure as any beginning, grim as an old man, mysteriously familiar yet unknown, like a word one can almost but not quite define.

How easy it was to lie when one had to lie!

For neither life nor nature cares if justice is ever done or not.