It's hard to resist the magical thinking that the work habits of great writers are the key to their greatness.

When I tried to do something else, everyone behaved as if I was Gypsy Rose Lee trying to paint a Matisse.

...what is romance, but a mutual pact of delusion? When the pact ends , there's nothing left.

We are bound by the secrets we share.

It's always a disappointing business confronting my own reflection. My body isn't bad. It's a perfectly nice, serviceable body. It's just that the external me- the study, lightly wrinkled, handbagged me- does so little credit to the stuff that's inside.

When you live alone, your furnishings, your possessions, are always confronting you with the thinness of your existence.

For most people, honesty is such an unusual departure from their standard modus operandi - such an abherration in their workaday mendacity - that they feel obliged to alert you when a moment of sincerity is coming on.