When a man gets power, even his chickens and dogs rise to heaven.

If children were brought up to become non-conformists it would only ruin their lives. So parents all over China who loved their children told them to do as Chairman Mao said. It was not possible to tell them anything else.

When I was in China, Mao was Chairman, and parents were terrified to tell their children anything that differed from the party line in case the children repeated it and endangered the whole family.

At the age of fifteen my grandmother became the concubine of a warlord general.

The Chinese seemed to be mourning Mao in a heartfelt fashion. But I wondered how many of their tears were genuine. People had practiced acting to such a degree that they confused it with their true feelings.

I would love mainland Chinese to read my book. There is a Chinese translation which I worked on myself, published in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Many copies have gone into China but it is still banned.

I always wanted to be a writer.