"I am so utterly a child. I am so utterly an adult."

"I felt like I was a stranger in my own life."

"Perhaps when we are old and ill, in a world of our own, we may feel as if we are of no account to anyone. But we are not old, not ill, and we have the world to live in."

"What horrifies me most is the idea of being useless: well-educated, brilliantly promising, and fading out into an indifferent middle age."

"I am afraid of getting married. I am afraid of losing my identity. I am afraid of being absorbed by a man. I am afraid of being reduced to a wife. I am afraid of being reduced to a mother. I am afraid…"