“A childhood is what anyone wants to remember of it.  It leaves behind no fossils, except perhaps in fiction.”

“Anyone's childhood can be an act of disablement if rehearsed and replayed and squinted at in a certain light. . .”

“Nothing matters except for the harvest, the gathering in, the adding up, the bringing together, the whole story, the way it happens and happens and goes on happening.(from "Collision")”

“We are too kind, too willing--too unwilling too--reaching out blindly with a grasping hand but not knowing how to ask for what we don't even know we want.”

“Write the book you want to read, the one you cannot find.”

“I won't even mention the swift, transitory reward of lemon spray wax. Danielle Westerman and I have discussed the matter of housework. Not surprisingly, she, always looking a little dérisoire, believes that women have been enslaved by their possessions. Acquiring and then tending--these eat up a woman's creativity, anyone's creativity. But I've been watching the ways she arranges articles on a shelf, and how carefully she sets a table, even with it is just me coming into Toronto to have lunch in her sunroom.”

“What I'd like is a lobotomy, a clean job, the top of my head neatly sawn off and designated contents removed.”