 For some reason, I seem to be bothered whenever I see acts of injustice and assaults on people's civil liberties. I imagine what I write in the future will follow in that vein. Whether it's fiction or non-fiction. |
| Now, most of the new immigrants coming to this country are from Asia as opposed to Europe. |
| It was clear that the special interest groups in California really wanted the Chinese to be shut out of the country, because that was where the racial tension was the greatest. |
| It's much more difficult to work on a broad subject than on a specific one, because even if it's hard to find the information, if you look hard enough for something specific you will find it, and you will discover things that you wouldn't have thought of before. |
| Racism is always there underneath, but usually it is exploited in these times of economic crisis, and it's hard to find out when one slides into another. |
| After working as a journalist I went to a writing program at Johns Hopkins. It was interesting because it was neither journalistic nor historical, but it emphasized writing style, and afterwards I was asked to write my first book. |
| Whatever is not commonly seen is condemned as alien. |
| The worst... was what the Pakistani soldiers did to the Bengali women after their failed rebellion. |
| The whole story of the comfort women, the system of forced sexual slavery, the medical experiments of Unit 731, is not something that is in the US psyche. That is changing because many books are coming out. |
| When the Chinese first came to San Francisco, they were actually welcomed by the mayor and they had special ceremonies for them-again this is when their colony was very small, only a few Chinese. |
| I may attempt a novel. I think that no matter what you write, it requires being honest with oneself, and you have to pull yourself out of the whirlwind of daily life. |
| There isn't much discussion of ruling class in America even in Boston, probably one of the most class-conscious cities in the country? |
| Often, what you see in the media is driven by economic forces. |
| I don't mind solitude. I love talking to other people, but I do need my space. |
| There are now hundreds of thousands of new engineers that are being trained in China. If people start finding themselves losing their jobs, not to the Chinese here but because China has become such a dominant force - then there could very well be a backlash. |
| If the conditions were right there could be great acceptance. Often it is only when they pose an economic or political threat that it turns really ugly. |
| Almost all people have this potential for evil, which would be unleashed only under certain dangerous social circumstances. |
| There isn't much in the way of pure communist spirit, because the whole nation seems to be engaged in capitalistic enterprises. Much of the country still operates under government control. |
| Your first duty as a writer is to write to please yourself. And you have no duty towards anyone else. |
| We have to keep in mind that it's not just about the numbers of people who died; it's also the manner which many of these victims met their deaths. |
