That there should be a purpose to suffering, that a person should be chosen for it, special - these are houses of the mind, in which whole peoples ha…

- Gish Jen

It's human to hear stories and to know how people live and to imagine how that is for them. It's very interdependent!

- Gish Jen

I like to listen. I'm much more interested in listening than in speaking, for sure.

- Gish Jen

I think that there is a bias in the current literary climate, which is not only very Western but very male.

- Gish Jen

A man was the sum of his limits; freedom only made him see how much so.

- Gish Jen

When I think about why I would be a writer, why I should continue to be a writer, it seems to me one of the few things you can dowhere you're never b…

- Gish Jen

Anything is possible. A man is what he makes up his mind to be.

- Gish Jen

I'm trying to give people an idea of what black looks like and what white looks like before I introduce them to gray.

- Gish Jen

Whatever I do in life, I'm almost always aware that there's another way to do it.

- Gish Jen