"But comedy has just allowed me to amplify those parts of myself, and while people are either laughing at me or with me, I'm ...

Otto Penzler, Highsmith's publisher, said of the novelist when she died in 1995: 'She was a mean, cruel, hard, unlovable, ...

Beating yourself up, inevitably feeling unlovable. So you hide your emotions and stay busy to protect yourself. But inside, it's impossible to ignore that sadness and loneliness are growing.