I think professionalism is important, and professionalism means you get paid.

I write lustily and humorously. It isn't calculated; it's the way I think. I've invented a writing style that expresses who I am.

It is for this, partly, that I write. How can I know what I think unless I see what I write.

As a past president of the Writers Guild, I think women shouldn't write for free. Maybe you have to do it for a time, to make a reputation, but I think the idea of giving your work away is the beginning of authors not being able to make a living.

The problem with feminism in the second wave was that we fought so much among ourselves, and I think we did so much damage to the movement... and I think the next wave, the third wave, is women mentoring younger women and women helping younger women to enter the political process and the writing world.

I'm interested in what happens to people when they get into that publicity machine. We tend to think things have changed, but there's still a deep sexism underlying the way women are treated publicly.