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Chinatown Quotes

Browse 22 quotes about Chinatown.

Chinatown Quotes

“You scour these Chinatowns of the mind, translating them like sutras Xuan Zhang fetched from India, testing ways return might be possible against these homesick inventions, trace the traveller's alien steps across borders, and in between discover how transit has a way of lasting, the way these Chinatowns grew out of not knowing whether to return or to stay, and then became home.”

PoetryHistoryMemoryNostalgiaSingaporeDiasporaChinatown
Book:Clear Brightness
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“Some people have a great fashion of calling things they do not like yellow. You exclude the yellow man. You fear the yellow peril. I edit a white paper turned out by yellow men, and many white men turn out yellow papers.”

RacismAsian AmericanChinatownAapiChinese AmericanYellowperil
Book:The White Devil's Daughters: The Fight Against Slavery in San Francisco's Chinatown
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“Anna lifted her chin, “Forgive my interruption, Mr. President, but I am Assistant Matron Anna Blanc, and I’ve come about the singsong girls.” She remembered herself and bowed. No one bowed back. They simply stared at her. After a moment, Tom Foo Yuen said, in his tar-thick accent, “You are a brave, strange woman, Matron Blanc.” Anna had heard that before.”

RomanceHistorical FictionChinatownEdwardian EraHistorical MysteryThe Woman In The Camphor TrunkAnna BlancHistorical Novel Mystery
Book:The Woman in the Camphor Trunk
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“You wouldn't think such a place as San Francisco could exist. The wonderful sunlight there, the hills, the great bridges, the Pacific at your shoes. Beautiful Chinatown. Every race in the world. The sardine fleets sailing out. The little cable-cars whizzing down The City hills. And all the people are open and friendly.”

PeopleThinkingWorldLittlesBeautifulRaceCitiesWonderfulCarShoesHillsBridgesFriendlySunlightSailingSan FranciscoCablesPacificBeautiful CitySardinesChinatown
Author:Dylan Thomas
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“Human beings are like detectives. They love a mystery. They love going where the mystery pulls them. What we don't like is a mystery that's solved completely. It's a letdown. It always seems less than what we imagined when the mystery was present. The last scene in `Blow Up' is so perfect because you leave the theater still dreaming. Or the end of `Chinatown,' where the guy says `Forget it, Jake, it's Chinatown.' It explains so much but it only gives you a dream of a bigger mystery. Like life. For me, I want to solve certain things but leave some room to dream.”

WantGivingHumansStillsEndsDreamSeemsLastsGuyCertainHuman BeingsPerfectForgetRoomsMysterySceneBiggerTheaterBlowSolveForget ItDetectivesJakeLetdownsChinatown
Author:David
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“My mother imparted her daily truths so she could help my older brothers and me rise above our circumstances. We lived in San Francisco's Chinatown. Like most of the other Chinese children who played in the back alleys of restaurants and curio shops, I didn't think we were poor. My bowl was always full, three five-course meals every day, beginning with a soup full of mysterious things I didn't want to know the names of.”

ThinkingKnowsWantChildrenHelpingMotherThreeCoursesNamesPoorFamilyFiveBrotherCircumstancesMysteriousChineseMealsRestaurantsShopsBowlsSoupSan FranciscoRise AboveAlleysOlder BrotherMysterious ThingsChinatownBack Alleys
Book:The Joy Luck Club
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“I love mysteries. To fall into a mystery and its danger ... everything becomes so intense in those moments. When most mysteries are solved, I feel tremendously let down. So I want things to feel solved up to a point, but there's got to be a certain percentage left over to keep the dream going. It's like at the end of Chinatown: The guy says, 'Forget it, Jake, it's Chinatown.' You understand it, but you don't understand it, and it keeps that mystery alive. That's the most beautiful thing.”

WantFeelsEndsMomentsDreamBeautifulGuyCertainFallLeftForgetAliveMysteryDangerIntenseBeautiful ThingsPercentagesForget ItLet DownJakeChinatown
Author:David Lynch
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“I got in my car and followed [Marlon Brando] down to Chinatown, and got about twelve shots. Brando called me over and said, What else do you want that you don't have already? And I said, I'd like a picture without the sunglasses. He said no and punched me right in the jaw, It was so fast I didn't see it coming. Blood was gushing out of my mouth. I drove to Bellevue. The jawbone and five teeth were broken... To this day he has scars on his knuckles from my teeth.”

WantSaidFiveBloodCarBrokenMouthsShotsTeethThis DayScarTwelveSunglassesKnucklesBrandoChinatown
Author:Ron Galella
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“My daughter Alexandra once told me, "Mother, you're a pioneer. Now, hardly anybody cooks, but you were one of the first to stop." After 20 years of cooking, I started to appreciate the value of other people's work. So I would, say, go get a duck in Chinatown. I always had the salad and set the table, but I didn't have to clean the pots.”

PeopleYearsFirstsMotherValuesDaughterAppreciateTablesCookingCleanCooksMy DaughterPotDucksPioneersSaladChinatown
Author:Nancy Pelosi
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“prepare a little hot tea or broth and it should be brought to them . . . without their being asked if they would care for it. Those who are in great distress want no food, but if it is handed to them, they will mechanically take it ' ... There was something arresting about the matter-of-fact wisdom here, the instinctive understanding of the physiological disruptions... I will not forget the instinctive wisdom of the friend who, every day for those first few weeks, brought me a quart container of scallion-and-ginger congee from Chinatown. Congee I could eat. Congee was all I could eat.”

IfsWantShouldFirstsLittlesMatterFactsCareUnderstandingForgetWeekHotTeaDistressMatter Of FactDisruptionContainersPhysiologicalGingerArrestingChinatownHot Tea
Author:Joan Didion
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“During the 1960s, one neighborhood in San Francisco had the lowest income, the highest unemployment rate, the highest proportion of families with incomes under four thousand dollars a year, the least educational attainment, the highest tuberculosis rate, and the highest proportion of substandard housing ... That neighborhood was called Chinatown. Yet, in 1965, there were only five persons of Chinese ancestry committed to prison in the entire state of California.”

YearsPersonsStatesFiveFourThousandHighestDollarsPrisonRateCommittedEducationalIncomeChineseCaliforniaProportionNeighborhoodUnemploymentLowestHousingSan Francisco1960sAttainmentAncestryTuberculosisUnemployment RateChinatown
Author:James Q. Wilson
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