There's Something Every Woman Wants, And That's

Is An Intelligent Human Being Likely To Be Much More Than A Large-scale Manufacturer Of Misunderstanding?

Literature Isn't A Moral Beauty Contest. Its Power Arises From The Authority And Audacity With Which The Impersonation Is Pulled Off; The Belief It Inspires Is What Counts.

When You Decide 'to Be A Writer,' You Don't Have The Faintest Idea Of What The Work Is Like. When You Begin, You Write Spontaneously Out Of Your Limited Experience Of Both The Unwritten World And The Written World. You're Full Of Naïve Exuberance. 'i Am A Writer!' Rather Like The Excitement Of 'i Have A Lover!' But Working At It Nearly Every Day For Fifty Years – Whether It Is Being The Writer Or Being The Lover – Turns Out To Be An Extremely Taxing Job And Hardly The Pleasantest Of Human Activities.

The Best Readers Come To Fiction To Be Free Of ... All That Isn't Fiction.

Obviously The Facts Are Never Just Coming At You But Are Incorporated By An Imagination That Is Formed By Your Previous Experience. Memories Of The Past Are Not Memories Of Facts But Memories Of Your Imaginings Of The Facts.