I felt my whole life was a facsimile of a life.

Long after the bomb falls and you and your good deeds are gone, cockroaches will still be here, prowling the streets like armored cars.

With publicity comes humiliation.

The older a woman gets, the more invisible you become.

Most of my life is just spent lying in bed. I mean, it's enough pressure to write the words. Do I need to use the additional energy exerted by sitting up?

The novel is never really in the first draft. The novel really happens in the revisions.

Whether I'm critically well received, whether or not I sell books - of course it becomes progressively harder to get them published - nevertheless, it's what I do, every day.

Why would I want to read something about somebody that's just a really nice, decent person who overcomes terrible trials? That's not how life is to me.

I feel like I sort of missed the eighties. At the time, we didn’t know we were having fun, which is probably the way it always is.

I was like a social worker for lepers. My clients had a chunk of their body they wanted to give away; for a price I was there to receive it.

I think the sixties must have been quite a lot of fun.

Her power was a wrenching thing, starless black and sorrow, but my magic was something more...it was hope.

Given the choice between the experience of pain and nothing, I would choose pain.

moving on means we have to protect ourselves.

A good student learns from his teacher. A great student learns to teach himself.

It is what we know already that often prevents us from learning.

I have a job to do. ... If you think right now I give a damn about presidential politics, then you don't know me.

I've never particularly liked the idea of looking back; I'd rather look forward

Sound economic fundamentals coupled with a number of positive factors have partially offset the psychological impact of rising interest rates in Hong Kong.

Time itself is the solution to all problems.

my lazy little shadow, like an arrant sleepy-head, Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed.