And what movies we saw! All the actors and actresses whose photographs I collected, with their look of eternity! Their radiance, their eyes, their faces, their voices, the suavity of their movements! Their clothes! Even in prison movies, the stars shone in their prison clothes as if tailors had accompanied them in their downfall.

I was the goldfish that leapt out of the bowl.

To be human is to be in a story.

In my early twenties, that's when I really began to write. Before that, I was too busy working, keeping myself going.

I have a painter's memory. I can remember things from my childhood which were so powerfully imprinted on me, the whole scene comes back.

I like to cook; it is, for me, a happy combination of mindlessness and purpose.

My first job was working in a dress shop in Los Angeles in 1940, for $7 a week.