"The worst thing: to give yourself away in exchange for not enough love."
- Joyce Carol Oates
"In love there are two things - bodies and words. "
"A daydreamer is prepared for most things."
"If you are a writer you locate yourself behind a wall of silence and no matter what you are doing, driving a car or walking or doing housework you can still be writing, because you have that space."
"And this is the forbidden truth, the unspeakable taboo - that evil is not always repellent but frequently attractive; that it has the power to make of us not simply victims, as nature and accident do,..."
"The challenge is to resist circumstances. Any idiot can be happy in a happy place, but moral courage is required to be happy in a hellhole."
". . . there is a wish in the heart of mankind to be distracted and confused. Truth is but one attraction, and not always the most powerful."
"For what are the words with which to summarize a lifetime, so much crowded confused happiness terminated by such stark slow-motion pain?"
"Unbidden, Unwelcome, Yet unable to resist, I entered a stranger's life"
"Keep a light, hopeful heart. But expect the worst."