Quotes from Min Jin Lee

Learn everything. Fill your mind with knowledge—it's the only kind of power no one can take away from you." Hansu never told him to study, but rather to learn, and it occurred to Noa that there was a marked difference. Learning was like playing, not labor.

History has failed us, but no matter.

No one is clean. Living makes you dirty.

We cannot help but be interested in the stories of people that history pushes aside so thoughtlessly.

a man must learn to forgive—to know what is important, that to live without forgiveness was a kind of death with breathing and movement.

a God that did everything we thought was right and good wouldn't be the creator of the universe. He would be our puppet.

Sunja-ya, a woman's life is endless work and suffering. There is suffering and then more suffering. It's better to expect it, you know. You're becoming a woman now, so you should be told this. For a woman, the man you marry will determine the quality of your life completely. A good man is a decent life, and a bad man is a cursed life—but no matter what, always expect suffering, and just keep working hard. No one will take care of a poor woman—just ourselves.

Noa had been a sensitive child who had believed that if he followed all the rules and was the best, then somehow, the hostile world would change its mind. His death may have been her fault for having allowed him to believe such cruel ideals.

There was more to being something than just blood.

because she would not believe that she was no different than her parents, that seeing him as only Korean—good or bad—was the same as seeing him only as a bad Korean. She could not see his humanity, and Noa realized that this was what he wanted most of all: to be seen as human.

Fill your mind with knowledge—it's the only kind of power no one can take away from you.

In Seoul, people like me get called Japanese bastards, and in Japan, I'm just another dirty Korean no matter how much money I make or how nice I am. So what the fuck?

In the end, your belly was your emperor.

It was not Hansu that she missed, or even Isak. What she was seeing again in her dreams was her youth, her beginning, and her wishes--so this is how she became a woman.

Yes, of course. If you love anyone, you cannot help but share his suffering. If we love our Lord, not just admire him or fear him or want things from him, we must recognize his feelings; he must be in anguish over our sins. We must understand this anguish. The Lord suffers with us. He suffers like us. It is a consolation to know this. To know that we are not in fact alone in our suffering.

Her father had taught her not to judge people on such shallow points: What a man wore or owned had nothing to do with his heart and character.

Life makes you pay...everybody pays something

Neither had realized the loneliness each had lived with for such a long time until the loneliness was interrupted by genuine affection.

Even if there were hundred bad Japanese, if there was one good one, he refused to make a blanket statement

He was suffering, and in a way, he could manage that; but he had caused others to suffer, and he did not know why he had to live now and recall the series of terrible choices that had not looked so terrible at the time. Was that how it was for most people?

People are awful. Drink some beer." Haruki

Although, if you like everything you read, I can't take you seriously. Perhaps you didn't think about these books long enough.

All her life, Sunja had heard this sentiment from other women, that they must suffer—suffer as a girl, suffer as a wife, suffer as a mother—die suffering. Go-saeng—the word made her sick.

But ideas can make men forget their own interests. And the guys in charge will exploit men who believe in ideas too much.