If art is not to be life-enhancing, what is it to be? Half the world is feminine - why is there resentment at a female-oriented art? Nobody asks The Tale of Genji to be masculine! Women certainly learn a lot from books oriented toward a masculine world. Why is not the reverse also true? Or are men really so afraid of women's creativity?

But no artist, I now realize, can be satisfied with art alone. There is a natural craving for recognition which cannot be gain-said.

Ordering a man to write a poem is like commanding a pregnant woman to give birth to a red-headed child.

Whether the psychological effect of color is direct...or whether it is the outcome of association, is open to question. The soul being one with the body, it may well be possible that a psychological tremor generates corresponding one through association.

All music is is what awakes from you when you are reminded by the instruments.

There are so many different narrative traditions across the world, and each of those traditions has evolved dramatically over time. Once I understood that, I felt truly free; I could write and invent the way I wanted to because there never has been only one way to tell a good story.