Quotes from Min Jin Lee

The peasants knew that a spoiled son did more harm to a family than a dead one, and they kept themselves from indulging him too much.

The Lord continues to be committed to us even when we sin. He continues to love us. In some ways, the nature of his love for us resembles an enduring marriage, or how a father or mother may love a misbegotten child. Hosea was being called to be like God when he had to love a person who would have been difficult to love. We are difficult to love when we sin; a sin is always a transgression against the Lord.

that 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.

She wished she had something like baseball that she could talk about with her daughter—a safe subject they could visit without subtext or aggression.

choose the important over the urgent.

the stories of Koreans in Japan should be told somehow when so much of their lives had been despised, denied, and erased.

Casey glanced at her plate again, recalling the posters of her elementary school lunchroom: YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT. So, how much you ate indicated the quantity of your desire. Walter was also implying that how quickly you got your food revealed the likelihood of achieving your goals. She was in fact terribly hungry, but she'd pretended to be otherwise to be ladylike and had moved away from the table to be agreeable, and now she'd continue to be hungry" (Free Food For Millionaires, p.92.)

Casey meant it when she said, 'Forgive us for our debts as we forgive our debtors,' because they were for her the hardest words to live by, and by saying them, she hoped they'd become possible. Like Ted, Casey would never discuss her ambivalent views on religion. She was honest enough to admit that her privacy cloaked a fear: the fear of being found out as a hypocrite" (Free Food For Millionaires, p.100-101.)

I'll take care of myself and my people. You think I'd trust my life to a bunch of politicians? The people in charge don't know anything. And the ones who do don't care.

And this is something Solomon must understand. We can be deported. We have no motherland. Life is full of things he cannot control so he must adapt. My boy has to survive.

All these people - both the Japanese and the Koreans - are fucked because they keep thinking about the group. But here's the truth: There's no such thing as a benevolent leader.

She has loved him, and she could not bear the thought of him being gone form this life.

For this was love, wasn't it? To have someone clean up after you, to think about you when you were sick, to not walk away when there was nothing to be gained for the labor required.

From the moment she'd met him, she'd felt his presence all around her.

to live without forgiveness was a kind of death with breathing and movement.

Listen, if people don't like you, it's not always your fault. My brother told me that.

It was always better to say less.

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.

I'm crazy. Poor and stupid. This is the reason why poor people stay poor, you know that? They spend all their money on pride.

He never told him to study, but rather to learn, and it occurred to him that there was a marked difference. Learning was like playing, not labor.

Girls think they'll have the upper hand because these kinds of men seem so pliable, when in fact, the girls are the ones who end up paying bitterly for their mistakes. The Lord forgives, but the world does not forgive.

The wife you choose will be your personal and social mirror.

What did Joseph say to his brothers who had sold him into slavery when he saw them again? "You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.

Somewhere after being sorry, there had to be another day, and even after a conviction, there could be good in the judgment.