" There is no beauty without ugliness, and no enjoyment without suffering; we have to have the shade in order to see the light, and that is all I do in a story, put my characters in the shade--and try before the ending, to have them in the sunlight.... My novels are based on dreams, and situations taken from my own life, in which I change the pattern so that what might have happened actually does happen--and therein lies the tale. "