There have been 50 or 60 books written about Empress Orchid, but none of them bothered to really examine the period in China when she lived. I was taught that she was evil; it's in all the textbooks.

Do you know who Karl Marx is? He is this strange little man, long dead, who lived his narrow little life, and somehow managed by the power of his wayward brain to lay hold upon millions of human lives!

No matter how American I become, I'm considered part of the Chinese community by my own family.

We were meant to survive because of our minds' ability to reason, our ability to live with frustration in order to maintain our virtue. We wore smiling masks while dying inside.

If one wants to get a boat ride, one must be near the river.

The self was a very strange concept to me until I came to America, and my child was born with that entitlement, and that just thrilled me.

I think about giving up. I almost do.