“When you can't bear something but it goes on anyway, the person who survives isn't you anymore; you've changed and become someone else, a new person, the one who did bear it after all.”

“Middle age is when you've met so many people that every new person you meet reminds you of someone else…”

“Who are you, anyway?
-Just someone who knows, from personal experience, how attractive it can be to think you can save somebody else by loving them.”

“The person who will bear much shall have much to bear, all the world through.”

“You might say that a creative person is a person who simply has a desire to have something, to add something to the world that's not there yet, and goes about arranging fort that to happen.... when you desire a work of art and make it, you've added to the stock of art in the world. Artists are one of the people who can do that: add to the stock of things.”

“Who's the real you? The person who did something awful, or the one who's horrified by the awful thing you did? Is one part of you allowed to forgive the other?”

“A woman you've endured such a gnawing of desire for, you can't help bearing a little grudge against, when the ache is gone.”

“A person isn't a bird. You can't cage a person.”

“Did you ever wonder if the person in the picture is the same one you see when you look in the mirror?" - "That's the eternal question, isn't it? Are we born who we are, or do we make ourselves that way?”

“It comes to me as a desire to have something in the world. And again to quote Blake, 'It is better to murder an infant in the cradle than to nurse an ungratified desire.'... You might say that a creative person is a person who simply has a desire to have something, to add something to the world that's not there yet, and goes about arranging fort that to happen.... when you desire a work of art and make it, you've added to the stock of art in the world. Artists are one of the people who can do that: add to the stock of things.”