People, no matter the economic class, find ways to feed their narcissism.

Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the dead.

Boring people don't know they're boring. That's the problem with boring people.

I'm trying always to leave out what I think is extraneous. And to find what I think is the most wonderful language to make a beautiful sentence.

I think it's true that unless human beings experience something, they simply don't understand what people are going through.

I'm the author of my own misery.

I don't think anybody says to Coetzee or Dostoyevsky or Kafka, "Your characters aren't likeable." It's not about your character winning a popularity contest. That's not the writer's job.

It's not the writer who determines how good she is anyway. Writers don't determine that. It's readers who determine that.

Do the obvious, you won't forget it. Do the obvious, you won't regret it. Obvious, obvious, obvious.

Nonfiction gives you subjects. Writing fiction I can have more fun, but I have to invent my subject.

Without curiosity a writer is dead.

Light is light.

Anyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence he is just using his memory.

Change terrifies people. They like new, but they don't like new with change.

You're not only the spotlight in which you perform, but the shadows where you practice.

I could almost see common sense and denial fighting away at each other within her. In the end, denial won, as it so often does.

I stop short of being a workaholic.

Clarity keeps you from boredom.

I was always attracted by the European way of life, but I am deeply Swedish.

If God made me a princess, why didn't he take a little more time and make my hair so it wouldn't snarl?

Maine's long and cold winters may help keep our State's population low, but our harsh climate also accounts for what is unique and valuable about our land and our people