Geling Yan Quotes

The pity is my expression in English is still young and not subtle enough. It’s not quite there. I read English very well, I know what good language is, and I want to reach the level of Nabokov and Conrad.

My dream is to write with both pens, in English and Chinese. I want to be more truthful and more straightforward when I write in English.

There are still many problems that aren't answered in China. As a writer, I have to keep searching for truth. The Chinese government still neglects many mistakes that were made during the Cultural Revolution and covering the facts. We need to revisit the old wounds.

I consider myself as having two selves. One self is Chinese and more delicate, more subtle, in terms of language. But the English self is young and audacious, and I say what I want to say.

I realized that on the internet, you can hide in invisibility, so speaking with another person is kind of like speaking to another part of yourself, or like confessing to a priest of your own creation. So it becomes very daring, very frank, with a desire to give the burdens you carry in your heart to the other person, to have that other person share the burden. Secrets are very heavy, and someone who keeps a huge secret cannot live carefree. Over time, the corrosiveness of secrets can erode the most intimate relationships.

With books or film I want to commemorate our youth and the sacrifices they made. No matter how bitter the time was, there is always something beautiful. I want to satisfy my nostalgia and hope [my work] is touching enough to move audiences who may not have the same experiences.

It’s always challenging to portray foreign characters in a novel that is told mainly from a Chinese perspective or, you may say, in a Chinese story.

From early on, I was nourished in a literary way. I didn't realize that there was a writer already living in me

I don’t consider myself a successful screenwriter. I write screenplays because I have no choice. Often I’m simply the director’s last resort. I think that good novel-writing emphasizes characterization. It’s the personality that makes a good movie or novel character unforgettable.

It’s frustrating seeing things lost in translation. Some expressions are just so Chinese, or so English, you have to switch your thinking to English in order to write it with spontaneity and naturally.

But these days in China the authorities don’t grant my novels official book licensing numbers, so there’s no way to publish them in China. For that reason, I’m considering writing in English again. I swim every day, and when I swim, I feel that swimming laps back and forth is rather boring, so I think about a novel’s structure, its beginning, its characters and such, and that way I enjoy swimming more. After I have swum for a few more months, maybe I can talk more concretely about my next project.

I think Chinese is a difficult language to translate. Every time a draft translation of my work lands on my desk, I read it as if it were someone else’s work. I think I have the ability to stay detached and read my own work objectively, because when I read a translation draft, I rarely compare a sentence or a paragraph with my original work. The only time I do is when I discover a passage that doesn’t sound right. I don’t nitpick. It’s unfortunate that Chinese is a such a unique language, with origins so different from Western languages, so every time I read a translation, I feel something is lost, some of the strength or color.