Free speech is life itself.

If you look at Indian movies, every time they wanted an exotic locale, they would have a dance number in Kashmir. Kashmir was India's fairyland. Indians went there because in a hot country you go to a cold place. People would be entranced by the sight of snow.

Hyperrealism can create an atmosphere of surrealism because nobody sees the world in such detail.

A relationship with an imaginary woman is preferable to a relationship with a real one.

Mo Yan is the Chinese equivalent of the Soviet Russian apparatchik writer Mikhail Sholokhov: a patsy of the regime.

I remember when I was young, many cities in the Muslim world were cosmopolitan cities with a lot of culture.

Nobody ever recognizes themselves unless they are not the character. There are many people who have claimed to be in my books, but unfortunately they were usually people that I didn't know.