Quotes
Authors
Ha Jin

"When the first emperor wanted to unify the country, one of the major policies was to create one system of written signs. By force, brutal force, he eliminated all the other scripts. One script became the official script. All the others were banned. And those who used other scripts were punished severely. And then the meanings of all the characters, over the centuries, had to be kept uniform as a part of the political apparatus. So from the very beginning the written word was a powerful political tool."

Source : "Ha Jin, The Art of Fiction No. 202". Interview with Sarah Fay, www.theparisreview.org. 2009.

Ha Jin

#Country Quotes #Powerful Quotes #Character Quotes

“Remember, the web isn't about control. If a visitor to your site is familiar with using a browser's native form doodad, you won't be doing them any favors if you override the browser functionality with your own widget, even if you think your widget looks better.”

Source : Jeremy Keith (2010). “HTML5 for Web Designers”
“There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that Saddam Hussein had and used significant weapons of mass destruction on his own people, both the Kurds and the Iranians.”
“The people in the West are supposed to believe that Bahrain is a country whose people live a life of peace, but we suffer under a regime that does not want to hear our screaming. The people of more than 20 villages are participating in the protests. They are fed up with the fact that they cannot express their opinions freely.”
“I've always been timid. I wait for the mating signal, yet I want to show my interest, but I'm too ***** bashful to go for it! I have no sympathy for wolves. Why can't a man wait and see if there is any interest in them? Every woman wants to be pursued, it's a courting dance, a mating game and it should be that way, played out. The world is full of creeps.”
“I have sought for happiness everywhere, but I have found it nowhere except in a little corner with a little book.”
“I no longer knew whether it was raindrops or my own tears that were flowing down my cheeks, and I hated to have to drag along this relic of a sniveling child.”

Source : Ingrid Betancourt (2010). “Even Silence Has An End: My Six Years of Captivity in the Colombian Jungle”, p.14, Hachette UK
“Then in came this script with another very low offer, and another drug addict and a depressing and difficult part to play. I thought, 'Why should I put myself through that for hardly any money?'”

Source : Guardian interview at the BFI, www.theguardian.com. November 4, 2000.
“If I had a magic wand, I would live in a building in New York, big enough so my friends, my family could all have apartments in it. We'd raise our kids in the same space and have backyard barbecues and get old and fat together.”

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