Aristotle didn't have a problem with abortion," she says. "Oh, well, good, that's a comfort," I say.

— Deborah Meyler

But in this case,” he continues, tracing the line of the plaster work with one finger, “I feel that there is one cliché that sums up my position so admirably that it would be pure egotism to attempt a more interesting periphrasis. Plain speaking, therefore, there is to be.“There is undoubtedly a strong possibility, notwithstanding the vagaries of contingency and misfortune, that my son might have fallen—or might, we could say, have voluntarily jumped, in accordance with the ethical codes with which he has been brought up—for a play you have made with some success, although, as I am persuaded you would concede, very little originality.” Plain speaking if you’re Henry James, perhaps.

— Deborah Meyler

I look up at the ceiling, at all the hardcover fiction. So very few people want it. It is operating as insulation rather than stock. The argument rages on about whether it is better to have books or e-books, but while everyone gets heated about the choices, the hardcover fiction molders quietly away.

— Deborah Meyler

I think there is no difference between love and infatuation. If it works out, we call it love; if it doesn’t, we shrug our shoulders and say it was infatuation. It’s a hindsight word.

— Deborah Meyler

It's a nebulous thing, but it is my belief—my experience also—that women do not have the need to collect that men have.

— Deborah Meyler

It seems shelving is an art, like everything else. I decide to do it exceptionally well.

— Deborah Meyler

Music is like poetry, It can stop you thinking. But it can also open you up.

— Deborah Meyler

People write for ego gratification, not money.

— Deborah Meyler

That thing that Hamlet says - "there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so". Not quite true if you are stuck under a grand piano, not quite true for genocide, but surely it must be true about love?

— Deborah Meyler

We're high on the adrenaline of feeling, even though we know it's fleeting and evanescence. And we're getting worse -- checking texts and emails and Facebook every five minutes, always searching for that next hit of feeling, that next morsel of approval.

— Deborah Meyler