We don't become geisha because we want our lives to be happy; we become geisha because we have no choice.

A wounded tiger is a dangerous beast.

Was life nothing more than a storm that constantly washed away what had been there only a moment before, and left behind something barren and unrecognizable?

It was what we Japanese called the onion life, peeling away a layer at a time and crying all the while.

After all, when a stone is dropped into a pond, the water continues quivering even after the stone has sunk to the bottom.

When a man takes a mistress, he doesn't turn around and divorce his wife.

Geisha because when I was living in Japan, I met a fellow whose mother was a geisha, and I thought that was kind of fascinating and ended up reading about the subject just about the same time I was getting interested in writing fiction.