"I do think the subject of women's writing is different: there is experience that hasn't been dealt with. You know you go through a period where you're very annoyed with all these male writers. They were your ideal intellectuals simply because they were the literary people of your youth. And then you go through a period where you just can't stand them. I just began to read Saul Bellow's short stories. I hadn't read Saul Bellow in a long time. But I saw how good the writing was. And I read it. And I liked it so much. I liked his stories. They were so beautiful. And there were no women in it. The guys had a woman, or they didn't have a woman or there was an aunt that everybody loved or an aunt that everybody hated. Whatever. But the wives were terrible. But I thought to myself, "Well, it doesn't matter so much maybe as long as we women have a voice." But unless we tell about our lives, those stories can't be listened to. You can't bear half the truth. But as long as we women are being read, then I can accept them."