Every piece of writing starts from what I call a grit a sight or sound, a sentence or happening that does not pass away but quite inexplicably lodges in the mind.

A garden isn't meant to be useful. It's for joy. Rumer Godden found in Power of Simple Living by Ellyn Sanna

I suppose the more you have to do, the more you learn to organize and concentrate-or else get fragmented into bits. I have learned to use my 'ten minutes'. I once thought it was not worth sitting down for a time as short as that; now I know differently and, if I have ten minutes, I use them, even if they bring only two lines, and it keeps the book alive.

Most grown people are like icebergs, three-tenths showing, seven-tenths submerged - that is why a collision with one of them is unexpectedly hurtful.

Every time a child, any child, is born, it is new - and different; that is the wonder.

People don't know the consolations of being unsuccessful ... If I had been successful I should have had no peace or time.

I don't know if I believe in God, but I know I believe in the devil. I have met him.