“I always thought eating was a ridiculous activity anyway. I'd get out of it myself if I could, though you've got to do it to stay alive, they tell me.”

“If I thought that what I'm doing when I write is expressing myself, I'd junk the typewriter. Writing is a much more complicated activity that that.”

“Across the room, I noticed that the closet hadn't stayed shut. The latch must not have caught, even though I'd leaned against the door. It had eased open to show a strip of inviting darkness.As if it was telling me I could always change my mind.”

“I don't care if they eat me alive, I've got better things to do than survive.”

“I couldn't get myself to read the want ads. The thought of sitting in front of a man behind a desk and telling him that I wanted a job, that I was qualified for a job, was too much for me. Frankly, I was horrified by life, at what a man had to do simply in order to eat, sleep, and keep himself clothed. So I stayed in bed and drank. When you drank the world was still out there, but for the moment it didn't have you by the throat.”

“When I was growing up, no one could get away with telling me I couldn't do something "because you're a girl." In fact, if someone wanted me not to do something, that was the worst thing they could say: It practically guaranteed I'd run out and try to do it.”