What a long way it is from one life to another: yet why write if not for that distance; if things can be let go, every before replaced by an after.

To write about a struggle amidst the struggling: one must hope that the muddling will end someday.

If I didn't self-censor, I would be in jail, and then I wouldn't be effective at all.

I think our eyes are trained to look for what we want to see.

I think the isolation in China also has to do with people's memories being wiped out, collective memories as well as individual memories, by the fact that the recent history has been constantly rewritten and revised.

In film, you have to present everything on the screen so it's the opposite of what I usually do with storytelling. It forced me to think about how people walk, where they sit at that moment. With Princess of Nebraska, it was just fun to watch because the movie was so far from the story. It was very much a different story.

No one is immune from either taking the wrong action or not taking action at all, but the sense that something is completely out of a person's control is stronger in China.