I loved the house the way you would any new house, because it is populated by your future, the family of children who will fill it with noise or chaos and satisfying busy pleasures. – Jane Smiley
When a novel has 200,000 words, then it is possible for the reader to experience 200,000 delights, and to turn back to the first page of the book and experience them all over again, perhaps more intensely. – Jane Smiley
I discovered that the horse is life itself, a metaphor but also an example of lifes mystery and unpredictability, of lifes generosity and beauty, a worthy object of repeated and ever changing contemplation. – Jane Smiley
In the traditional urban novel, there is only survival or not. The suburban idea, the conformist idea, that agony can be seen to and cured by doctors or psychoanalysis or self-knowledge is nowhere to be found in the city. Talking is a way of life, but it is not a cure. Same with religion. – Jane Smiley