Unless, of course, there's no such thing as chance;...in which case, we should either-optimistically-get up and cheer, because if everything is plann… - Salman Rushdie

Literature is where I go to explore the highest and lowest places in human society and in the human spirit, where I hope to find not absolute truth but the truth of the tale, of the imagination of the heart.

He remembered the old Chinese proverb, sometimes ascribed to Confucius: If you sit by the river for long enough, the body of your enemy will float by.

A son who will never be older than his motherland - neither older nor younger. There shall be two heads – but you will only see one – there will be knees and a nose, a nose and knees. Newspaper praises him, two mothers raise him! Bicycles love him – but crowds will shove him! Sisters will weep, cobras will creep… Washing will hide him – voices will guide him! Friends will mutilate him – blood will betray him! Spittoons will brain him – doctors will drain him – jungle will claim him – wizards reclaim him! Soldiers will try him – tyrants will fry him… He will have sons without having sons! He will be old before he is old! And he will die before he is dead!