Christianity has kept itself going for centuries on hope alone, and has perpetrated all manner of naughtiness in the meantime.

I am a good and interested mother - which has surprised me.

A creative writing workshop will contain students whose ambitions and abilities, whose conceptions of literature itself, are so diverse that what they have in common - the desire to write - could almost be considered meaningless.

Even if they knew the truth of their own feelings, most mothers would be socially and emotionally incapable of revealing it.

You could time a suburban story by your watch: it lasts as long as it takes a small furry animal that's lonely to find friends, or a small furry animal that's lost to find its parents; it lasts as long as a quick avowal of love; it lasts precisely as long as the average parent is disposed on a Tuesday night to spend reading aloud to children.

Christianity has kept itself going for centuries on hope alone, and has perpetrated all manner of naughtiness in the meantime.

Honest criticism, I suppose, has its place. But honest writing is infinitely more valuable.