Janet Frame

“Not all wounds are so obvious. Enter silently into the world of a person wronged.”

“The dead are the only people to have permanent addresses.”

“Is it not possible that the ultimate end is salvation by imagination?”

“I write from a need to make sense of life, and to create order from chaos.”

“A writer must stand on the rock of her self and her judgment or be swept away by the tide.”

“The past is a country from which we have all emigrated.”

“For your own sake, do not be afraid of being lonely.”

“The sun is a thief. It steals the colour from the curtains, the books, and the heart.”

“I learned that I was not alone, that others had suffered, that the crazy world was not personal.”

“I think of the word ‘quiet’ as a precious gift, as a state to be cultivated.”

“It's a pity that the rich have all the ice and the poor have all the appetite.”

“Life is a hospital in which every patient is possessed by the desire of changing his bed.”

“A book is a door, and you can open it and go through.”

“Perhaps I shall not write another book. I have been kneeling in the confessional for over fifty years.”

“I wanted to be a poet. I had been struck by the finality of the printed word.”