“I was once part of a Christmas cabaret. I sang 'I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus.' I tap-danced. I had a ten-gallon hat. It was quite absurd.”

“My mother was an elementary school teacher for 35 years and taught at the Nixon School in New Jersey. I was raised as a very liberal Democrat, and she was protesting Nixon when he was in office.”

“Animals used for food are treated like unfeeling machinery.”

“Any swagger is just defense. When you're reminded so much of who you are by people - not a fame thing, but with my size, constantly, growing up - you just either curl up in a corner in the dark or ...”

“What I really want is to play the romantic lead and get the girl.”

“I have a need to always make people laugh. I have a desperate need. I love a great sense of humor. The people I sort of surround myself with have that.”

“No black woman writer in this culture can write "too much". Indeed, no woman writer can write "too much"...No woman has ever written enough.”

“When you reduce a woman to writing, she makes you think of a thousand other women”

“I would venture to guess that Anon, who wrote so many poems without signing them, was often a woman.”

“Anna thought about the men outside on the gallery. She was glad they were there; finding them smoking and talking quietly had been comforting, it was what men did in the evenings when the work was ...”

“Her arms groped forward to guide her when her tears blocked her vision in darkness. Then she couldn't run any more. She sank to her knees and began to cry in her terror. She wanted Gary.She suddenl...”

“Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast,Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round,And, while the bubbling and loud hissing urnThrows up a steamy column and the cupsThat cheer but not inebr...”

“She let out a laugh, and then she put her hand over her mouth, like she was angry at herself for forgetting her sadness.”

“If you don't learn to laugh at life it'll surely kill you, that I know.”

“Through all of living have much joy and laughter, life is to be enjoyed, not just endured.”