[George Saunders] is very precise about what he is doing. There isn't a thing left to chance.

I find it impossible to experience either pride or shame over accidents of genetics in which I had no active part. I'm not necessarily proud to be female. I am not even proud to be human — I only love to be so.

Time is how you spend your love.

Oh, I know that. You know me, baby, I cannot be broken. Takes a giant to snap me in half.

I do my best work under pressure, so I’ll nick an artery, and my husband isn’t allowed to stanch the bleeding till I’ve banged out a chapter.

The young people have a phrase for this now, which is "slay in your lane." That's a very important principle of writing. You have to work out what it is you can't do, obscure it, and focus on what works.

I lost many literary battles the day I read 'Their Eyes Were Watching God.' I had to concede that occasionally aphorisms have their power. I had to give up the idea that Keats had a monopoly on the lyrical.