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

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.

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

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

You have to defend your honor. And your family.

Some girls are taught to be sexy.

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 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.

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 me that life is not like that.

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

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

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.

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

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.

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

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 are creative, when they have character.

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

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 make a point would.

I was always inventing characters and making up stories.

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 you will win their respect.

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

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.

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 life.

A lot of my writing is not terribly civilized.

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

Every American deserves to live in freedom, to have his or her privacy respected and a chance to go as far as their ability and effort will take them - regardless of race, gender, ethnicity or economic circumstances.

I don't want to sound pompous, but I really think your gender doesn't necessarily dominate your sexual activity.

Capitalism knows only one color: that color is green; all else is necessarily subservient to it, hence, race, gender and ethnicity cannot be considered within it.

There are not as many women who support the national defense budget now as men. I really think there is a gender gap in the support for the large expenditures that are necessary to modernize the force.

There is no original or primary gender a drag imitates, but gender is a kind of imitation for which there is no original.

As far as I'm concerned, being any gender is a drag.

If you think about the way the hearings were structured, the hearings were really about Thomas' race and my gender.

Gender equality is more than a goal in itself. It is a precondition for meeting the challenge of reducing poverty, promoting sustainable development and building good governance.

What everyone in the astronaut corps shares in common is not gender or ethnic background, but motivation, perseverance, and desire - the desire to participate in a voyage of discovery.

The pandemic of AIDS is a gender-based disease.

But let me tell you, this gender thing is history. You're looking at a guy who sat down with Margaret Thatcher across the table and talked about serious issues.

Most men are very attached to the idea of being male, and usually experience a lot of fear and insecurity around the idea of being a man. Most women are very identified with their gender, and also experience a tremendous amount of fear and insecurity.

Every year I teach dozens of students at the University of Birmingham. Most of the students on the gender and sexuality courses are women. I guess this is because the boys don't think that gender applies to them: that it's a subject for girls.

All the English speakers, or almost all, have difficulties with the gender of words.

When the Nobel award came my way, it also gave me an opportunity to do something immediate and practical about my old obsessions, including literacy, basic health care and gender equity, aimed specifically at India and Bangladesh.

Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging.

There are still traces of discrimination against race and gender, but it's a lot different than when I started out. It just comes quietly, slowly, sometimes so quietly that you don't realize it until you start looking back.

We are a model country where gender equality is concerned.

But the issue of sexual harassment is not the end of it. There are other issues - political issues, gender issues - that people need to be educated about.

I'm suspicious of any man or woman who approaches their own liberation with any kind of gender bias.

Ah, well, do I wish that we lived in a world where gender didn't figure so prominently? Of course. Do I even think about myself as a woman when I go to make art? Of course not.

I didn't want to be discriminated against because of my gender and status. I promised myself I was never going to be treated as a second-class citizen.