I Knew I Would Be Famous One

Sometimes I Get The Start Of A Story From A Memory, An Anecdote, But That Gets Lost And Is Usually Unrecognizable In The Final Story.

Naturally My Stories Are About Women - I'm A Woman. I Don't Know What The Term Is For Men Who Write Mostly About Men. I'm Not Always Sure What Is Meant By "feminist." In The Beginning I Used To Say, Well, Of Course I'm A Feminist. But If It Means That I Follow A Kind Of Feminist Theory, Or Know Anything About It, Then I'm Not. I Think I'm A Feminist As Far As Thinking That The Experience Of Women Is Important. That Is Really The Basis Of Feminism.

In Twenty Years I've Never Had A Day When I Didn't Have To Think About Someone Else's Needs. And This Means The Writing Has To Be Fitted Around It.

I Don't Always, Or Even Usually, Read Stories From Beginning To End. I Start Anywhere And Proceed In Either Direction. A Story Is Not Like A Road To Follow, It's More Like A House. You Go Inside And Stay There For A While.

I Began To Understand That There Were Certain Talkers - Certain Girls - Whom People Liked To Listen To, Not Because Of What They, The Girls, Had To Say, But Because Of The Delight They Took In Saying It. A Delight In Themselves, A Shine On Their Faces, A Conviction That Whatever They Were Telling About Was Remarkable And That They Themselves Could Not Help But Give Pleasure. There Might Be Other People - People Like Me - Who Didn't Concede This, But That Was Their Loss. And People Like Me Would Never Be The Audience These Girls Were After, Anyway.