I write to find out what I am thinking. I write to find out who I am. I write to understand things.

The point is not to pay back kindness but to pass it on.

Each of us will have to make the choices that allow us to be the largest versions of ourselves.

It's like my whole world is coming undone, but when I write, my pencil is a needle and thread, and I'm stitching the scraps back together.

A novel is not, after all, a historical document, but a way to travel through the human heart.

A book does not discriminate against any reader. All are welcome at the table of literature.

Don't plan it all. Let life surprise you a little.

Everyone needs a strong sense of self. It is our base of operations for everything that we do in life.

I admit that for me love goes deeper than the struggle, or maybe what I mean is, love is the deeper struggle.

Every writer can tell you that a book is only truly alive when it finds passionate readers who bring it alive in their imaginations.

I grew up in a dictatorship, where you couldn't talk about difficult situations - there was this culture of silence. We would run into a problem and have no one to talk to.

I want to drag knives over my skin, just to feel something other than shame, but I'm not even brave enough for that

Truth might be heroic, but it was not within the range of practical domestic politics.

The art of betrayal has not taught me to be bitter, but to not so easily misplace trust.

My faith has wavered but has saved me.

Anger is energy, and you've got to find a place to put it that works for you.

I came out to California from Texas, to the Haight, and the Fillmore and all that stuff, and totally got the bug.

It takes a great deal of courage and independence to decide to design your own image instead of the one that society rewards, but it gets easier as you go along.

If I set out to sculpt a standing man and it becomes a lying woman, I know I am making art.

There will be no job cuts arising out of this merger in Europe - this is in the interest of jobs in Europe.

You almost felt sorry for the devil cause heaven knows he didn't have a prayer, when Mama prayed.