Nothing quite has reality for me till I write it all down–revising and embellishing as I go. I’m always waiting for things to be over so I can get home and commit them to paper.

Beware of the man who denounces woman writers; his penis is tiny and he cannot spell.

Though my friends envied me because I always seemed so cheerful and confident, I was secretly terrified of practically everything.

You’re afraid of criticism,’ she says. ‘But criticism is a sign of life! You know who doesn’t get criticized? Nonentities! Only the dead escape criticism.

Without the gods, how would I sing?’ I asked.With your own voice,’ he said.

I stand in the mist and cry, thinking of myself standing in the mist and crying, and wondering if I will ever be able to use this experience in a book.

You are always naked when you start writing; you are always as if you had never written anything before; you are always a beginner. Shakespeare wrote without knowing he would become Shakespeare

Every decision I have made – from changing jobs, to changing partners, to changing homes – has been taken with trepidation. I have not ceased being fearful, but I have ceased to let fear control...

The words carry their own momentum. A confession in motion tends to stay in motion. Newton’s first law of jealousy.

But if the gods do not exist at all – then we are lost,’ I said.On the contrary – we are found!’ said Aesop.But when we are afraid, who can we turn to, if not...

All writing problems are psychological problems. Blocks usually stem from the fear of being judged. If you imagine the world listening, you’ll never write a line. That’s why privacy is so important. You should write...

Women in America read ‘lifestyle’ pages which are really glorifications of shopping. They teach us we must veil ourselves in make-up to be loved. And we willingly take the veil, thinking ourselves freed by it....

Any system was a straightjacket if you insisted on adhering to it so totally and humorlessly.

And what is laughter anyway? Changing the angle of vision.

Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn’t.

Critics write out of intellectual exercise, not poets. Poets write straight from the heart.

When women have so absorbed the disease of sexism that they themselves can inflict it on each other, we clearly have a perfect, self-replenishing machine for the continuation of sexism. Unable to turn our assertiveness...

Take your life in your own hands, and what happens? A terrible thing: no one to blame.

Uno no tiene por qué pedir disculpas si quiere ser el dueño de su propia alma… para bien o para mal. Cuando ya todo se ha dicho y hecho, es todo cuanto queda.

…filled her memory bank with shiny coins.

Most people in this country are looking for literature that is useful. They feel that just exploring their feelings is good enough – they should be reading about leveraged buy-outs or how to get thin....

And the trouble is, if you don’t risk anything, you risk even more.

Beware of books. They are more than innocent assemblages of paper and ink and string and glue. If they are any good, they have the spirit of the author within. Authors are rogues and ruffians...

La verdad es que las fantasías, fantasías son y una no puede vivir extasiada todos los días del año. Incluso si das un portazo y te largas, incluso si jodes con todo el mundo a...

Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it’s cracked up to be. That’s why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for,...

It was easy enough to kill yourself in a fit of despair. It was easy enough to play the martyr. It was harder to do nothing. To endure your life. To wait.

Every woman artist has to kill her own grandmother. She perches on our shoulder whispering, “Don’t embarrass the family.

The trouble is, if you don’t risk anything, you risk even more.

Novices in the arts think you have to start with inspiration to write or paint or compose. In fact, you only have to start. Inspiration comes if you continue. Make the commitment to sit still...

Fame means millions of people have the wrong idea of who you are.

The ultimate sexist put-down: the prick which lies down on the job. The ultimate weapon in the war between the sexes: the limp prick. The banner of the enemy’s encampment: the prick at half-mast. The...

…readers who think I have answers when all I have are a few pointed questions…

Sometimes it was worth all the disadvantages of marriage just to have that: one friend in an indifferent world.

Even when we are screaming and throwing things, we are friends. Who is the man and who is the woman? Sometimes neither of us knows. The marriage is androgynous — like the closest friendships. It...

Someday every woman will have orgasms- like every family has color TV- and we can all get on with the business of life.

Fame turns out to be a powerful instrument of grace because it humbles its chosen victims in a hurry. You sail into it, your canvas swelled with grandiosity, and when your fifteen minutes are over...

I have accepted fear as part of life – specifically the fear of change… I have gone ahead despite the pounding in the heart that says: turn back….

How did I get to be a grown-up? At times, I find myself still sitting on the hillside, plotting revenge against the adult world.

That is what you love a friend for: the ability to change your angle of vision, bring back your best self when you feel worst. And speak the truth — but without malice. Loving candour...

I tried to keep myself away from him by using con words like “fidelity” and “adultery”, by telling myself that he would interfere with my work, that I had him I’d be too happy to...

Rendall’s first law of jealousy: jealousy does the cock harder and pussy wetter.

Show me a woman who doesn’t feel guilty and I’ll show you a man.

Young women dream of romance and passion as men dream of conquest because those dreams are necessary goads to leaving home and growing up.

We also fought about everything — like real sisters. We fought about money, bedrooms, whose car to take. Everyone of these fights was actually about something else — usually abandonment. I wanted to be first...

But we [women] are only at the beginning [of revamping feminism]. And our strictures on each other prove this. Our enforcement of thinness, of non-sexuality, of ‘good’ feminism versus ‘bad’ feminism, are proofs of our...

Everyone has talent. What’s rare is the courage to follow it to the dark places where it leads.

the body is wiser than its inhabitants. the body is the soul. the body is god’s messenger.

Why are women so ungenerous to other women? Is it because we have been tokens for so long? Or is there a deeper animosity we owe it to ourselves to explore?A publisher…couldn’t understand why women...

If we are all made of God, it is our friends who remind us. We pass the gift of God to them. They pass it back to us when we need it most.

Naomi Wolf dares to explode the myth of ‘victim feminism’ and pleads for allowing women to be as full of good and bad desires as men, as avid for sexual fulfilment and power as men,...