A lot of my writing is not terribly civilized.

You have to defend your honor. And your family.

I always thought that if I was popular I must be doing something wrong.

Girls are crazy and mean. They don’t fight fair.

I think that if you have a strong narrative, if the idea of the song can be boiled down to the basics, it won’t change that much.

I still consider myself a feminist.

My mother wanted me to understand that as a woman I could do pretty much whatever I wanted to, that I didn’t have to use sex or sexuality to define myself.

But I never want to get to the point where I write a safe song or one that represents my sense of a subject in order to appear civilized.

There are no rules in fights with girls. Just hurting.

Besides dancing at school and the studios, I’d written all these songs and had begun to play them at auditions.

I was always inventing characters and making up stories.

Some girls are taught to be sexy.

I didn’t go out looking for fights as a kid, but if it was necessary, I’d fight. Fighting was a daily thing where we lived.

My intellect has always been more responsible than my emotions for how I respond to the world.

I still feel conflicted because I don’t always get to spend as much time with my daughter as I’d like, given my work.

Of course, sometimes when you write personally, you are also writing about society, obliquely reflecting topical issues, but not in a way that people would expect you to or in the way that someone trying...

To me, a feminist belongs in the same category as a humanist or an advocate for human rights. I don’t see why someone who’s a feminist should be thought of differently.

I was the oldest child, and both my parents worked, so I had a great deal of responsibility from a very young age.

Don’t make a threat and then not do it.

And I really wanted a driver’s license. I was 43, had my learner’s permit and had failed the test once already – but that was in Riverhead, on Long Island.

Writing in other voices is almost Japanese in the sense that there’s a certain formality there which allows me to sidestep the embarrassment of directly expressing to complete strangers the most intimate details of my...

I refuse to slap some stupid words on the stupid paper just so we have a stupid song finished.

I wouldn’t characterize my work, however, as directly political.

Marc will do his best to reschedule the concerts after he has fully recovered from this incident. Suzanne has agreed to join him for the rescheduled dates.

How weird it was to drive streets I knew so well. What a different perspective.

There is a certain style of writing. I don’t know how to describe it exactly. It’s idiosyncratic, it’s very personal. It also can be very social. It’s very unsentimental, very stark sometimes, usually about the...

It takes as much discipline to be a mother and a wife as it does to do anything else.

I loved the atmosphere of the dance studios-the wooden floors, the big mirrors, everyone dressed in pink or black tights, the musicians accompanying us-and the feeling of ritual the classes had.

Sometimes I listen to songs by very smart writers who assume that the world is a civil place with certain formalities that people follow, but I don’t see things that way. My own experience tells...

I think it’s a really good option for someone my age,

If you have to fight a crowd of boys, it’s best to go for the biggest one. That way you won’t have to fight them all. The others will see that you mean business and...

He was the first person I ever saw live on stage, and I was really offended by everything he was doing,

In the end, my pursuit of the elusive New York State driver’s license became about much more than a divorced woman’s learning to drive for the first time.

I fingerpick a lot because I can get more of a range of feeling from the guitar than I can when I bash away with a pick.

So you eat, you sleep, and then this wonderful child comes out, but you don’t feel like you have any control over that process, over her, over her character and who she is.

I’d like to meet you/ In a timeless placeless place/ Somewhere out of context/ And beyond all consequences.

I had some fears as a kid, but I was also relatively fearless. Maybe that’s a result of living half the time in reality and the other half in fantasy.

Solitude stands by the window/ She turns her head as I walk in the room/ I can see by her eyes she’s been waiting/ Standing in the slant of the late afternoon

I loved the atmosphere of the dance studios – the wooden floors, the big mirrors, everyone dressed in pink or black tights, the musicians accompanying us – and the feeling of ritual the classes had.

I wasn’t afraid of going places or doing new things. I would do just about anything or go anywhere. I’d get a notion in my mind and just follow it.

When I was pregnant, I felt filled with life, and I felt really happy. I ate well, and I slept well. I felt much more useful than I’d ever felt before.

That said, I’ve never thought the fact that I’m a woman was important to my work.

Writing is always personal in some way but not always in a direct way.

I think people are sexy when they have a sense of humor, when they are smart, when they have some sense of style, when they are kind, when they express their own opinions, when they...

Today I am/ a small blue thing / Like a marble/ or an eye

I don’t think gender is aesthetically defining for me.

It’s striking how commercially viable that impulse for instant intimacy is right now, especially in songs and writing.