“A mother is a story with no beginning. That is what defines her.”

“Behind all your stories is always your mother's story. Because hers is where yours begin.”

“But behind all your stories is always your mother's story, because hers is where yours begins.”

“But there's a story behind everything. How a picture got on a wall. How a scar got on your face. Sometimes the stories are simple, and sometimes they are hard and heartbreaking. But behind all your stories is always your mother's story, because hers is where yours begin.”

“Once upon a time – for that is how all stories should begin – there was a boy who lost his mother.”

“She cannot remember her mother's face... This is the woman who brought her into the world... This is the woman her father loved. Yet every time she turns her mind's eye in her mother's direction she sees only the men she is talking to, the children she is playing with, the maids to whom she is giving orders... She begins to realise how alike they are, she and her mother, these blank sheets on which men have written their stories, the white space between the words, making all their achievements possible and contributing nothing to the meaning.”