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Ken Liu Quotes

Ken Liu quote from classy quote

The fact that we can never have complete, perfect knowledge does not absolve us of the moral duty to judge and to take a stand against evil.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Absolve Complete Duty Evil Fact Knowledge Moral Perfect Stand Truth

We are not defined by our individual loneliness, but by the web of relationships in which we’re enmeshed.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Loneliness Philosophy Relationships

The Allatians believe that they have a writing system superior to all others. Unlike books written in alphabets, syllabaries, or logograms, an Allatian book captures not only words, but also the writer’s tone, voice, inflection, emphasis, intonation, rhythm. It is simultaneously a score and a recording. A speech sounds like a speech, a lament a lament, and a story re-creates perfectly the teller’s breathless excitement. For the Allatians, reading is literally hearing the voice of the past.But there is a cost to the beauty of the Allatian book. Because the act of reading requires physical contact with the soft, malleable surface, each time a text is read, it is also damaged and some aspects of the original irretrievably lost. Copies made of more durable materials inevitably fail to capture all the subtleties of the writer’s voice, and are thus shunned.In order to preserve their literary heritage, the Allatians have to lock away their most precious manuscripts in forbidding libraries where few are granted access. Ironically, the most important and beautiful works of Allatian writers are rarely read, but are known only through interpretations made by scribes who attempt to reconstruct the original in new books after hearing the source read at special ceremonies.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Bookmaking Books

Do you see how much power you have when you act without fear?

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Fear Fearless Fearlessness Power

Taking away men's weapons will be not bring peace. They'll fight with sticks and stones, and tooth and nail. Mapidéré's is a peace supported only by fear, as secure as a nest built on a rotten branch.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Fear Fearmongering Tyranny

There is far more happiness in a life that is your own than a life in which you are handed the lines to say and shown the gestures to make. Do not ever be ambitious.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Ambition Freedom Happiness L Pursuit Of Happiness

But being the mirrors for each other's souls has a cost: by the time they part from each other, the individuals in the mating pair have become indistinguishable. Before their merger, they each yearned for the other; as they part, they part from the self. The very quality that attracted them to each other is also, inevitably, destroyed in their union.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Cost Merger Mirror Other Self Soul Union

Clearing away the superficial structure of the reigns of emperors and the dates of battles, there was the deeper rhythm of history's ebb and flow not as the deeds of great men, but as the lives lived by ordinary men and women wading through the currents of the natural world around them: its geology, its seasons, its climate and ecology, the abundance and scarcity of the raw material for life.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu History

But it's not really Chinese, is it?'Logan was thoughtful for a moment. I don't know. I guess you'd say it's really not if you look back thousands of years. But I don't think that way. Lots of things start out not Chinese and end up that way.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Chinese History Traditions

I don't pay much attention to the distinction between fantasy and science fiction–or between “genre” and “mainstream” for that matter. For me, all fiction is about prizing the logic of metaphors-which is the logic of narratives in general–over reality, which is irreducibly random and senseless.We spend our entire lives trying to tell stories about ourselves–they’re the essence of memory. It is how we make living in this unfeeling accidental universe tolerable. That we call such a tendency “the narrative fallacy” doesn’t mean it doesn’t also touch upon some aspect of the truth.Some stories simply literalize their metaphors a bit more explicitly.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Fantasy Fiction Genre Logic Mainstream Memory Metaphor Narrative Reality Science Fiction Stories Truth

Who can say if the thoughts you have in your mind as you read these words are the same thoughts I had in my mind as I typed them? We are different, you and I, and the qualia of our consciousnesses are as divergent as two stars at the ends of the universe.And yet, whatever has been lost in translation in the long journey of my thoughts through the maze of civilization to your mind, I think you do understand me, and you think you do understand me. Our minds managed to touch, if but briefly and imperfectly.Does that thought not make the universe seem just a bit kinder, a bit brighter, a bit warmer and more human?We live for such miracles.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Consciousness Mind Miracle Thoughts Translation Universe

I have seen the poor suffer when nobles seek the purity of ideals. I have seen the powerless die when princes believe in the nostalgia of their dreams. I have seen the common people torn from peace and thrown into war when kings yearn to test the clarity of their vision.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Power Rulers Suffering The Past

He intrigued her. Powerful men, in her experience, were usually not so full of doubt. Kuni was consumed by the desire to do good for others, but uncertain what good might be and whether he was the right man for the job.Kuni was the sort of man, Risana realized, who, rather than deceive himself, was so full of self-doubt that he could not longer see himself

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Goodness Power Self Doubt

As the wind continued to howl and groan through her decaying body, she began to sing her story.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Epigram Books Fiction Ken Liu Lontar Lontar 6 Running Shoes Short Stories Short Story Speculative Fiction

I thought my duty was to restore Haan, but Haan is not King Cosugi or the burned-down palace or the ruins of the great estates or the dead nobles and their descendants pining for glory-these are but parts of an experiment at a way of life for the people of Haan, her true essence. When the experiment has proven to be a failure, one must be willing to try new paths, new ways of doing things.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Change Revolution Society

I've always thought it nonsense to believe something true simply because it was written in a book long ago.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Belief Philosophy Truth

Time's arrow is the loss of fidelity in compression. A sketch, not a photograph. A memory is a re-creation, precious because it is both more and less than the original.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Arrow Compression Fidelity Memory Original Photograph Precious Sketch Time

At this moment, in this place, the shifting action potential in my neurons cascade into certain arrangements, patterns, thoughts; they flow down my spine, branch into my arms, my fingers, until muscles twitch and thought is translated into motion; mechanical levers are pressed; electrons are rearranged; marks are made on paper.At another time, in another place, light strikes the marks, reflects into a pair of high-precision optical instruments sculpted by nature after billions of years of random mutations; upside-down images are formed against two screens made up of millions of light-sensitive cells, which translate light into electrical pulses that go up the optic nerves, cross the chiasm, down the optic tracts, and into the visual cortex, where the pulses are reassembled into letters, punctuation marks, words, sentences, vehicles, tenors, thoughts.The entire system seems fragile, preposterous, science fictional.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Flow Fragile Neurons Patterns Science Fiction System Thoughts Translation

It is as if the Caru'ee were able to perceive an echo of the past, and unconsciously, as they built upon a palimpsest of books written long ago and long forgotten, chanced to stumble upon an essence of meaning that could not be lost, no matter how much time had passed.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Echoes Meaning Remembrance

As a jailer, I never got to understand my charges. But when I became a bandit, I spent a lot of time being close to the lowliest of the low: criminals, the enslaved, deserters, men who had nothing to lose. Contrary to what I had expected, I found that they had a hardscrabble beauty and grace. They were not mean in their nature, but made mean by the meanness of their rulers. The poor were willing to endure much, but the emperor had taken everything from them.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Suffering Tyrany

Yet, my grandfather was not a monster. He was simply a man of ordinary moral courage whose capacity for great evil was revealed to his and my everlasting shame. Labeling someone a monster implies that he is from another world, one which has nothing to do with us. It cuts off the bonds of affection and fear, assures us of our own superiority, but there's nothing learned, nothing gained. It's simple, but it's cowardly. I know now that only by empathizing with a man like my grandfather can we understand the depth of the suffering he caused. There are no monsters. The monster is us.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Evil Monstrosity

There is often no line between perfection and evil.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Evil Perfection Perfectionism

There are many ways to say I love you in this cold, dark, silent universe, as many as the twinkling stars.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Love Many Stars Twinkling Universe Ways

Some have said I should demand that the surviving members of Unit 731 be brought to justice. But what does that mean? I am no longer a child. I do not want to see trials, parades, spectacles. The law does not give you real justice.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Justice

One has to be careful, whenever one tells a story about a great injustice. We are a species that loves narrative, but has been taught not to trust an individual speaker.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Injustice Stories

Those men and women of Yangzhou died a hundred years ago, Tian Haoli, and nothing can be done to change that. But the past lives on in the form of memories, and those in power are always going to want to erase and silence the past, to bury the ghosts. Now that you know about the past, you're no longer an innocent bystander. If you do not act you are complicit with the Emperor and his Blood Drops in this new act of violence, this deed of erasure. Like Wang Xiuchu, you're now a witness. Like him, you must choose what to do. You must decide if, on the day you die, you will regret your choice.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Awareness Complacency Responsibility

Every act of communication is a miracle of translation.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Communication Miracle Translation

The way I look at it is this: If you try to obey the law, and the judges call you a criminal anyway, then you might as well live up to the name.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Crime Defiance Rebellion Tyrany

Platitude or not, the crowd erupted into applause, and by acclamation, Kuni Garu became the Duke of Zudi. A few pointed out that titles of nobility really couldn't be handed out in such a democratic fashion, but these killjoys were ignored.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Democracy Humor Nobility

Mapidéré was but one man-and indeed, judging by rumors of his decrepit state near death, a weak, sickly man-but his creation, the empire, had taken on a life of its own. Killing the emperor would not have been enough. We have to kill the empire.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Empire Revolution

Emperor, king, general, duke,” he whispered to himself. “These are just labels. Climb up the family tree of any of them high enough and you’ll find a commoner who dared to take a chance.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Ambition Commoners Rags To Riches Royalty Upliftment

But in a time of war, knowledge made interesting friendships. Soon, the scholars and the thieves were . . . well, thick as thieves.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Humorous Quotes

A loyal servant does not think of things outside of his control.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Loyalty

A momentary smile appeared on Cogo's face before fading away. No matter how many times he saw it, he was still amazed by how Kuni's sincerity shaded into an instinct for political theater. He was, of course, moved by the loyalty of a man who would rather be in jail than betray him, but he also knew to play it for all it was worth to cement even more loyalty.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Deception Manipulation Politics Sincerity

Sometimes, the anger built up so much that people had to scream out their treasonous thoughts just to keep on breathing. Maybe not all of the were really crazy, but it was best for everyone involved to pretend that they were.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Oppression Tyranny

I think writing novels has taught me more about the value of patience and being organized. I've learned to use timelines and wikis to track decisions and make sure everything still fits together. It's both easier and harder than writing short fiction.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Together Writing Short

If I end up having a novel that sells really well and that allows me to pay for health insurance and mortgage without having to work at a day job, that would be great.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Work Day Great

There's this long history of colonialism and the colonial gaze when applied to matters related to China. So a lot of conceptions about China in literary representations in the West are things you can't even fight against because they've been there so long that they've become part of the Western imagination of China.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu History Fight Long

The 'silk' in silkpunk refers not to a source of power, but to an entirely different, expressive technology language.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Power Language Different

The evolution of technology is, like the evolution of literature, heavily path-dependent. Culture plays a far more important role in the acceptance, adoption, and spread of technology than many of us are willing to acknowledge.

~ Ken Liu

Ken Liu Culture Acceptance
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