Jayne Anne Phillips

Books about women and children are not valued in the same way as a book about war. And why is that? I don't know.

I think we really forget how connected we are to the past.

I tell my students that being a writer is like being a member of a medieval guild and that what we are doing is very subversive and very important.

I studied international relations and economics at the University of Virginia. I paid my way by working as a bartender in the summer and at three part-time jobs during the year.

Well, I actually wrote her a letter a couple of days ago congratulating her. The tone I tried to convey in the letter is, look, you are a part of a great American historical process.