The writer's object is - or should be - to hold the reader's attention.

I want the reader to turn the page and keep on turning until the end.

If a man is a writer, everybody tiptoes around past the locked door of the breadwinner. But if you're an ordinary female housewife, people say, 'This is just something Barbara wanted to do; it's not professional.'

A relentless talent for tactlessness.

Britain had an air of careless supremacy which GALLED her neighbors.

They resented the patronage they depended upon.