Even though no one admits it, writers are leaders in their communities.

At the beginning of all growth, everything imitates.

Every good teaching may still end up producing evil bandits who have no principles whatsoever, an outcome even more likely when the teacher is also a bandit.

I will not close my eyes, neither those in my head nor those in my soul, as the ship carries me away, along with my future, my dreams, and my beliefs. Buru Island is no happy land somewhere; it's but a way station on my journey in life—though to believe even that much will require no small measure of hope.

Let us see whether it is the New Order or me who will be the loser before Indonesian history. I have won. The New Order has fallen and my writings have been translated into 40 languages.

I happen to be pretty productive when I am in jail. When you are in jail, you have to spend more time with yourself.

Humankind is able to create new conditions, a new reality. We are not fated to swim forever among the realities that are here now. ... Everything that is worthwhile in human civilization has not only originated from but has been inspired by dreams, by imagination.