Laurel could not see her face but only the back of her neck, the most vulnerable part of anybody, and she thought: Is there any sleeping person you c… - Eudora Welty

(Why have there been so few really great women writers?) EW: Well, I think there have been not a few great women writers, of course, Jane Austen. I don't see how anyone could have a greater scope in knowledge of human nature and reveal more of human nature than Jane Austen. Consider Virginia Woolf. The Brontës. Well, you know as many as I do: great women writers.

Great fiction shows us not how to conduct our behavior but how to feel. Eventually, it may show us how to face our feelings and face our actions and to have new inklings about what they mean. A good novel of any year can initiate us into our own new experience.

I am a writer who came from a sheltered life. A sheltered life can be a daring life as well. For all serious daring starts from within.