Ma Jian Quotes

• To become self-aware, people must be allowed to hear a plurality of opinions and then make up their own minds. They must be allowed to say, write and publish whatever they want. Freedom of expression is the most basic, but fundamental, right. Without it, human beings are reduced to automatons.

  Ma Jian

  Writing, Self, Expression

  "China’s Olympic Crossroads: Author Ma Jian on Beijing, Spectacle and Reality". Interview with Flora Zhang, beijing2008.blogs.nytimes.com. August 5, 2008.

  47 Copy quote

• Only when you are aware of the uniqueness of everyones individual body will you begin to have a sense of your own self-worth.

  Ma Jian

  Self Worth, Body, Individual

  15 Copy quote

• When history is erased, people's moral values are also erased.

  Ma Jian

  People, Moral, Moral Values

  11 Copy quote

• I believe that the power of literature is stronger than the power of tyranny.

  Ma Jian

  Believe, Stronger, Literature

  8 Copy quote

• My hope is that the Chinese government will come to realise that it is futile to repress free speech, and that contrary to what they believe a regime's strength rests not its suppression of a plurality of opinions and ideas, but in its capacity and willingness to encourage them.

  Ma Jian

  Believe, Government, Ideas

  "Exiled author Ma Jian banned from visiting China" by Tania Branigan, www.theguardian.com. July 29, 2011.

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• The Chinese people have been forced to forget the Tiananmen massacre. There has been no public debate about the event, no official apology. The media aren't allowed to mention it. Still today people are being persecuted and imprisoned for disseminating information about it.

  Ma Jian

  Apology, Media, People

  "China’s Olympic Crossroads: Author Ma Jian on Beijing, Spectacle and Reality". Interview with Flora Zhang, beijing2008.blogs.nytimes.com. August 5, 2008.

  16 Copy quote

• Everything I was I carry with me, everything I will belies waiting on the road ahead.

  Ma Jian

  Travel, Waiting, Inspiring Travel

  10 Copy quote

• The literal meaning of the Chinese characters for revolution is elimination of life

  Ma Jian

  Character, Chinese, Revolution

  Ma Jian (2008). “Beijing Coma: A Novel”, p.66, Macmillan

  4 Copy quote

• I meant that the Chinese people are not aware of their own entrapment. They believe they live in a free society, but don't realize how much they are being monitored and controlled, how much the information they receive is restricted and warped, until they step out of line, that is, and feel the heavy hand of the state fall on them.

  Ma Jian

  Believe, Fall, Hands

  "Search Rings SEARCH China’s Olympic Crossroads: Author Ma Jian on Beijing, Spectacle and Reality". Interview with Flora Zhang, beijing2008.blogs.nytimes.com. August 5, 2008.

  7 Copy quote

• Tyrannies not only want to control your mind and thoughts but your flesh as well.

  Ma Jian

  Mind, Flesh, Want

  6 Copy quote

• China is completely lacking in self-awareness and as someone who has stepped outside that society, I have a responsibility to write about it as I see it.

  Ma Jian

  Writing, Responsibility, Self

  "Home truths from the exile". www.theguardian.com. May 2, 2004.

  8 Copy quote

• Before the counter-culture revolutionary Li Lian was executed in 1971 for criticising the Cultural Revolution, pour policemen pushed her face against the window of a truck, lifted her shirt and cut out her kidneys with a surgical knife,’ Mau Sen said, his face stony and white. ‘I think that removing the organs of convicts while they are still alive is too much. It completely contravenes medical ethics.’ ‘This is a dissection class, not a political meeting,’ Sun Chunlin said.

  Ma Jian

  Cutting, Thinking, Counter Culture

  7 Copy quote

• I will not let a political party tell me how to live, when to die or what to believe in. Our souls are linked to the universe, but we can never see heaven, because our flesh ties us to the earth and the people around us. But when the people around you have lost their will to be free, then earth becomes a hell.

  Ma Jian

  Party, Believe, Ties

  7 Copy quote

• In 1989, I was on Tiananmen Square with the students, living in their makeshift tents and joining their jubilant singing of the Internationale. In the two decades since, each time that I have gone back, visions from those days seem to return with increasing persistence.

  Ma Jian

  Persistence, Two, Squares

  "The great Tiananmen taboo" by Ma Jian, www.theguardian.com. June 1, 2009.

  52 Copy quote

• I left Beijing in 1987, shortly before my books were banned there, but have returned continually.

  Ma Jian

  Book, Beijing, Banned

  "The great Tiananmen taboo" by Ma Jian, www.theguardian.com. June 1, 2009.

  7 Copy quote

• Living in London is like being on a luxury cruise liner.

  Ma Jian

  Luxury, London, Cruise

  4 Copy quote

• The Beijing Olympics represent China's grand entrance onto the world stage and confirmation of its new superpower status.

  Ma Jian

  World, Olympics, Confirmation

  "China’s Olympic Crossroads: Author Ma Jian on Beijing, Spectacle and Reality". Interview with Flora Zhang, beijing2008.blogs.nytimes.com. August 5, 2008.

  4 Copy quote

• I wanted to analyse and understand how the Chinese people could have their lives so crushed by fear.

  Ma Jian

  People, Chinese, Crushed

  "Home truths from the exile". Interview With Stephanie Merritt, www.theguardian.com. May 1, 2004.

  4 Copy quote

• Beijing Coma took me 10 years to finish.

  Ma Jian

  Years, Beijing, Coma

  "The great Tiananmen taboo" by Ma Jian, www.theguardian.com. June 1, 2009.

  58 Copy quote

• In February of this year I returned to China to research my next book. The authorities know about the novels of mine that have been published in the west, including the latest one, Beijing Coma, about a student shot in Tiananmen Square, but so far have allowed me to return.

  Ma Jian

  Book, Years, Squares

  "The great Tiananmen taboo" by Ma Jian, www.theguardian.com. June 1, 2009.

  4 Copy quote

• It is vitally important for me, both personally and for my writing, to be able to return to China freely, so being barred entry has caused me deep concern and distress.

  Ma Jian

  Writing, Important, Able

  "Exiled author Ma Jian banned from visiting China" by Tania Branigan, www.theguardian.com. July 29, 2011.

  4 Copy quote

• Red Dust was about the late 1980s; it was a time of burgeoning hopes and opening up and people searching for new ways.

  Ma Jian

  Dust, Opening Up, People

  "Home truths from the exile". Interview With Stephanie Merritt, www.theguardian.com. May 1, 2004.

  4 Copy quote

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