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Lisa See

Lisa See Books

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Peony in Love

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Shanghai Girls

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Dreams of Joy

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“Other kids get white rice, but the food you give us makes it look like we're living a subsistence life.” “I buy white rice for the New Year's Festival,” I said, stung. Then, defensively, “I often put barley in your lunch –” “Which is even more embarrassing, because that means we're really poor.” “What a lucky child you are to say that. You don't know what poor means –”

ChildrenPoorPoverty
Book:The Island of Sea Women
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“I have heard that you should not do bed business after too much hard work, " Snow Flower told me, "but I don't believe that my mother-in-law has heard that." She looked exhausted. I felt the same way after visiting my husband's home-from the nonstop labor, from being polite, and from always being watched. "This is the one rule my mother-in-law doesn't respect either," I commiserated. "Haven't they heard an exhausted well yields no water?”

DespairFatigue
Book:Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
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“Every day since waking up in the hospital I've wanted to die, but watching that man sink below the waves, I feel something inside me rise up. A Dragon doesn't surrender. A Dragon fights fate. This is not some loud, roaring feeling. It feels more like someone blew on an ember and found a slight orang glow. I have to hang on to my life—however ruined and useless. Mama's voice comes floating to me, reciting one of her favorite sayings, "There is no catastrophe except death; one cannot be poorer than a beggar." I want—need—to do something braver and finer than dying.”

BraveryResilienceYear Of The Dragon
Book:Shanghai Girls
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“La amistad es completamente diferente. Nadie nos impone a los amigos; los elegimos nosotros. No nos une una ceremonia, ni la responsabilidad de engendrar un hijo; nos unen las experiencias y los momentos vividos. Nos une una chispa que saltó cuando nos conocimos; las risas y las lágrimas que hemos compartido; los secretos que guardamos y protegemos como un tesoro. La fascinación ante la certeza de saber que el otro, aún siendo tan diferente a ti, entiende las razones de tu corazón como nadie lo hará jamás.”

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Book:The Island of Sea Women
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“Parents die, daughters grow up and marry out, but sisters are for life. She is the only person left in the world who shares my memories of our childhood, our parents, our Shanghai, our struggles, our sorrows, and yes, even our moments of happiness and triumphant. My sister is the one person who truly knows me, as I know her. The last thing May says to me is "When our hair is white, we'll still have our sister love.”

SisterhoodSister Love
Book:Shanghai Girls
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“To see Snow Flower's mother eat that meat was something I'll never forget. She had been raised to be a fine lady and, as hungry as she was, she did not tear into the food as someone in my family might. She used her chopsticks to pull apart slivers of the pork and lift them delicately to her lips. Her restraint and control taught me a lesson I have not strayed from to this day. You may be desperate, but never let anyone see you as anything less that a cultivated woman.”

Etiquette And Attitude
Book:Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
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“Every woman who enters the sea carries a coffin on her back,” she warned the gathering. “In this world, in the undersea world, we tow the burdens of a hard life. We are crossing between life and death every day.” These traditional words were often repeated on Jeju, but we all nodded somberly as though hearing them for the first time. “When we go to the sea, we share the work and the danger,” Mother added. “We harvest together, sort together, and sell together, because the sea itself is communal.”

WomenThe SeaCommunal LifeHaenyeoJejuSea Women
Book:The Island of Sea Women
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“These are universals, as is the fear women feel during times of political upheaval that occur in what could still be called the outside world of men--whether during the Taiping Rebellion so many years ago or today for women in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Sudan, or even right here in this country in the post-9/11 era. On the surface, we as American women are independent, free, and mobile, but at our cores we still long for love, friendship, happiness, tranquility, and to be heard.”

InspirationalWomen S RightsAuthor S NoteAuthor S Acknowledgement
Book:Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
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“Mille anni addietro il poeta Han Yun scrisse: «Tutto ciò che non ha pace griderà forte». Paragonò il bisogno umano di esprimere i sentimenti con la scrittura alla forza naturale che spinge le piante a stormire nel vento, o il metallo a risuonare quando viene percosso. Formulata quella considerazione, seppi cosa fare. Ci lavoravo da anni. Privata del mondo esterno, avevo passato la vita a guardarmi dentro e le mie emozioni erano finemente accordate.”

ScritturaEmozioniIntroversione
Book:Peony in Love
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“If it is perfectly acceptable for a widow to disfigure herself or commit suicide to save face for her husband's family, why should a mother not be moved to extreme action by the loss of a child or children? We are their caretakers. We love them. We nurse them when they are sick. . . But no woman should live longer than her children. It is against the law of nature. If she does, why wouldn't she wish to leap from a cliff, hang from a branch, or swallow lye?”

IfsShouldChildrenDoeActionFacesLawMotherWishLossHusbandSickSuicideMovedExtremesCommitBranchesLeapNurseAcceptableLaws Of NatureCliffsWidowsLoss Of A ChildCaretakers
Author:Lisa See
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