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

Freedom is a public library.

There was no way to grasp the reality of the present which slid away each second, invisible as air; reality only existed after the fact, in one's vision of the past.

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.

People steal into one's consciousness and occupy what seems, in retrospect, to have been their place all along.

When you read to a child, when you put a book in a child's hands, you are bringing that child news of the infinitely varied nature of life. You are an awakener.

My life was incoherent to me. I felt it quivering, spitting out broken teeth.