Quotes from Maxine Hong Kingston

The day was a great eye, and it was not paying much attention to me now.

Here they all were together, idle above their fields, nobody hoeing, godlike; nobody weeding, New Year's in summer.

I saw twelve angels wheeling in the sun, rays of white wings and gold light. "Swans!

Probably all babies, having recently been nothing, have a tenuous hold on life.

There can't be a pure myth, especially when the myth has been handed down in the oral tradition. As the stories are told, they change. If the stories don't change they just die.

I have found things that I could have done better in 'The Woman Warrior.' But then I thought: Let the work of one's youth just stand.

Let my life as Poet begin. I want the life of the Poet. I have labored for over twelve years, one thousand pages of prose. Now, I want the easiness of poetry. The brevity of the poem.

I am confirmed in my belief that war is utter destructive violent chaos. There is no "art," no "order(s)," no "just war." No matter what the ideologies, wars are the same.

The way I'm going now is to focus on peace, to create peace. As Sister Corita said, "I don't go to anti-war rallies. I go to peace rallies."

Daughters-in-law lived with their husbands' parents, not their own; a synonym for marriage in Chinese is "taking a daughter-in-law.

To me success means effectiveness in the world, that I am able to carry my ideas and values into the world--that I am able to change it in positive ways.

Not many women got to live out the daydream of women—to have a room, even a section of a room, that only gets messed up when she messes it up herself.

Hunger also changes the world - when eating can't be a habit, then neither can seeing.

I learned to make my mind large, as the universe is large, so that there is room for contradictions.

Perhaps women were once so dangerous that they had to have their feet bound

We seem to be always on cusps. Women come out of the burkah, the niqab, purdah, the closet, then go back in again. Of course, what we need do is to value the happy freedom of all beings.

The work of preservation demands that the feelings playing about in one's guts not be turned into action. Just watch their passing like cherry blossoms.

The sweat of hard work is not to be displayed. It is much more graceful to appear favored by the gods.

The difference between mad people and sane people... is that sane people have variety when they talk-story. Mad people have only one story that they talk over and over.

...I've learned exactly who the enemy are. I easily recognize them-business-suited in their modern American executive guise, each boss two feet taller than I am and impossible to meet eye to eye.

Chinese-Americans, when you try to understand what things in you are Chinese, how do you separate what is peculiar to childhood, to poverty, insanities, one family, your mother who marked your growing with stories, from what is Chinese? What is Chinese tradition and what is the movies?

To me success means effectiveness in the world, that I am able to carry my ideas and values into the world - that I am able to change it in positive ways.

Let my life as Poet begin. I want the life of the Poet. I have labored for over twelve years, one thousand pages of prose. Now, I want the easiness of poetry. The brevity of the poem.

In a time of destruction, create something.