Chang-Rae Lee Quotes

Where you're from only matters in relation to where you are.

My home is San Francisco - that is definitely what I consider my home.

Perhaps home is not a place but simply an irrevocable condition.

An individual is not distinct from his place. He is his place.

Where we are is vital to who we are.

Many Lexington natives believe they live in a special place, one impossible to leave. I'm not so sure about that - or it's more accurate to say I think a more general truth exists beneath it: the place you first call home stays with you always, whether you remain or go.

So I do not consider myself a chronicler of my fatherland or even a chronicler of Havana.

What you lose in blindness is the space around you, the place where you are, and without that you might not exist. You could be nowhere at all.

The world belongs to no one. There are very few people who fit into the world. And part of the struggle of every human life is to somehow claim a place on the planet, but it's at the forefront of the experience of the wandering race. The wandering people.

I don't think I'm an outsider at all.

It seems to me psychologically I'm a Canadian.

Home is where I am. Sadly, I don't need a history to be able to exist somewhere.

I do consider myself as being French, I suppose.

Where you are defines what you're interested in.

I am more of a New Yorker than ever and just actually, sometimes I fantasize about living somewhere else, where it's maybe not quite so crowded or stressful, blah, blah, blah and after September 11th, I guess I could just not imagine living anywhere else.

I wrote the script to 'Lady Bird,' and it really came out of a desire to make a project about home - like, what the meaning of home is, and place. I knew Sacramento very well, obviously, growing up there, and I felt like the right way to tell a story of a place was through a person who's about to leave it.

I don't think many people consider in their heart that they have two places that are home.

I consider myself a Chicagoan, and if anybody else does, that gratifies me.

A big piece of my heart is definitely in Michigan and will always be in Michigan. Growing up there is definitely a big part of who I am as a person.

Even the dark places are places. You're still somewhere.

I don't really think of Minnesota when I think of home.

It's interesting to think about the different forms one place can take.

A self is a frightening thing to waste, it's the lens through which one's whole life is viewed, and few people are willing to part with it, in death, or even imaginatively, in art.

Knowing where and who are intimately linked.

It ain't where you're from, it's where you're at.