Mum used to hide love letters from my boyfriends and put me down. Now I understand that she was a Polish immigrant forced to settle in Chicago. She was jealous of the freedom life gave me.

[With depression] you get a real sense of shame, because your friends go, 'Oh come on, show me the lump, show me the x-rays,' and of course you've got nothing to show.

My whole career has been an act of revenge.

How come every other organ in your body can get sick and you get sympathy, except the brain?

I always ask the booksellers to look at me and recommend a book; 9 out of 10, they get it right; it’s usually a book about someone dysfunctional. To me bookstores are like brothels of imagination, each book is luring me over going, 'Read me, read me'.

My ultimate fantasy is to entice a man to my bedroom, put a gun to his head and say, 'Make babies or die'.

College athletes used to get a degree in bringing your pencil.