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We are lost, she and I, unseen and not seeing, unheard and not hearing, unknown by others.

Amy Tan

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Amy Tan
Age: 72
Born: 1952
Born: February 19
Essayist
Film Writer
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
Oakland
California
Amy Ruth Tan
Hearing
Seeing
Lost
Others
Unheard
Unseen
Unknown

More quotes by Amy Tan

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I saw what I had been fighting for: it was for me, a scared child.
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It's a luxury being a writer, because all you ever think about is life.
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I loved fairy tales when I was a kid. Grimm. The grimmer the better. I loved gruesome gothic tales and, in that respect, I liked Bible stories, because to me they were very gothic.
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I wanted my children to have the best combination: American circumstances and Chinese character. How could I know these things do not mix?
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And then she had to fill out so many forms she forgot why she had come and what she had left behind.
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I wanted to write stories for myself. At first it was purely an aesthetic thing about craft. I just wanted to become good at the art of something. And writing was very private.
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If I now recognize evil in other people, is it not because I have become evil too?
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That is the way it is with a wound. The wound begins to close in on itself, to protect what is hurting so much. And once it is closed, you no longer see what is underneath, what started the pain.
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And I remember wondering why it was that eating something good could make me feel so terrible, while vomiting something terrible could make me feel so good.
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I hid my deepest feelings so well I forgot where I placed them.
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I am fascinated by language in daily life: the way it can evoke an emotion, a visual image, a complex idea, or a simple truth.
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So much of history is mystery. We don't know what is lost forever, what will surface again. All objects exist in a moment of time. And that fragment of time is preserved or lost or found in mysterious ways. Mystery is a wonderful part of life.
Amy Tan
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I started a second novel seven times and I had to throw them away.
Amy Tan
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I began to look at all events and all things as relevant, an opportunity to take or avoid.
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I would find myself laughing and wondering where these ideas came from. You can call it imagination, I suppose. But I was grateful for wherever they came from.
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You can get sucked into the idea that, 'Gosh, this is impressive. Maybe I should do this. It will look good.' Or 'I'll write like this because it will impress that critic.'
Amy Tan
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I've always been a magnet for guilt.
Amy Tan
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Wise guy, he not go against wind. In Chinese we say, Come from South, blow with wind -- poom! -- North will follow. Strongest wind cannot be seen.
Amy Tan
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A psychiatrist does not want you to wake up. He tells you to dream some more, to find the pond and pour more tears into it. And really, he's just another bird drinking from your misery.
Amy Tan
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Libraries are the pride of the city.
Amy Tan