Only by recalling a dream is an insomniac sure he’s slept.

I heard so many stories from Gaomi’s peasants that I had an irrepressible urge to write them down. Today, Gaomi’s peasants know that they have become famous around the world through my writings, but I think they are a little puzzled by this.

We’re already too late, so there’s no need to go any faster.

Surrounded by progress, I feel a nagging sense of our species’ regression.

How do you know Spotted Neck has a big spot on his neck?

As a child who grew up in a grassy field, enjoying little formal education, I know virtually nothing about literary theories and have had to rely solely upon my own experiences and intuitive understanding of the world to write.

I’d discovered that the range of beauty in breasts is wide; while one should never lightly say that a pair is ugly, one can easily say that a pair of breasts is beautiful. Hedgehogs are beautiful sometimes; so are baby pigs.

There are times when everything on earth spits out the stench of human blood.

Old Du,” he said, “what would people think if you started a fight with a blind man? We all live in the same village. We win some arguments and we lose others, but it’s always a matter of someone’s bowl smashing into someone else’s plate, and that’s how it goes. Up there on Changbai Mountain, it’s no easy matter to run into a fellow villager, so you feel as if you’re with family!

Don’t swallow a scythe if your stomach isn’t curved.