I've embraced rock 'n' roll because it encompasses all the things I'm interested in: poetry, revolution, sexuality, political activism - all of these things can be found in rock 'n' roll. But I am also engaged in all of these things separately.

I'm a worker. I do the work to communicate, and I want people to embrace it, and when they do I'm happy.

The film [Dream of Life], in the end, is life-affirming, and I think it's always useful for people to be reminded that no matter how rough things get, no matter what kind of twists and turns our lives can take, we can keep going, we can create something new.

I actually had another motivation for letting Steven [Sebring] film us. After I'd been out of the public eye for 16 years, lost my friends and lost my husband, some of my confidence had been undermined. Steven made the process of filming fun; I could pretend that we were in something like Don't Look Back.

It was no hardship to me to spend long hours reading and writing.

For I desired, as Youth does, to be taken by the hand and hurled into the world.

A writer, or any artist, can’t expect to be embraced by the people [but] you just keep doing your work - because you have to, because it’s your calling.