I was very inspired by the French writer, Colette, who actually late in life was a big, beefy woman. She writes very beautifully about the body and its hungers and appetites and she sticks in women who love food and they may love sex, but en route to the assignation they stop off at a bistro and have something nice to eat. I fully approve of that. Because I decided early on I wanted to write. I made these terribly serious decisions about art.
Babies do tend to get in the way of that.
It's difficult for women, I think. I mean, in later life when I met the man I'm now with who I love very much, I wanted to have a child. And then I discovered that, because of some stupid birth control I'd been given, I'd been made infertile and I couldn't have babies. I kept having miscarriages instead. And it was incredibly sad.