The anti-immigrant logic has basically saturated our world. I'm staying, and I'm fighting. Junot Diaz More Quotes by Junot Diaz More Quotes From Junot Diaz This country wants to live in the illusion that it is tolerant but also wants to be able to practice intolerance. Junot Diaz practice want country Honestly, connecting once at the deepest level with someone, you know, once you've done that, even if your life goes to hell, man, it was really worth living. Junot Diaz levels done men Love is the only thing - I don't want to say that "makes it bearable" - but I feel like without the possibility of love, this place would just devour us. Junot Diaz possibility want love-is You can't be a human without seeing. Junot Diaz seeing humans There's little question that short stories, like poetry, don't get the respect they deserve in the culture - but what can you do? Like Canute, one cannot fight the sea, you have to go with your love, and hope one day, things change. Junot Diaz one-day fighting sea Dominican men are told to look at women all the time, but they're definitely not told to see them. Junot Diaz men looks When you're the ones in the life raft and you have four or five women in the life raft who put it together, by the end of it your nerves are blown. The people you're going to attack are the people who are helping you, who you are holding it together with. Junot Diaz nerves together people If you were a nerd computer geek in 1982, the amount of isolation you felt - at least what I experienced, or the kids I knew, the isolation they felt - was almost total. They were not part of society; no one thought they were cool. Junot Diaz geek nerd kids We're accepted as long as we conform to what we are expected to be, and I'm sure that's not any different for anyone else. Junot Diaz accepted different long You're Dominican only if you do this, this, and that. And if you do this and that, you'll be accepted to a certain degree and if you don't, people will scorn you for it. Junot Diaz accepted degrees people I was really drawn to thinking about the women in my life. Thinking about my mother, who's a very powerful force on me. And I have these two very strong sisters who took up a lot of imaginary space in my life. Junot Diaz powerful strong mother We can speculate. Last time I checked, the future doesn't take my advice. Junot Diaz last-time lasts advice As for my slowness as a writer - that's been a struggle, no question. We live in a culture that values and rewards machine-speed productivity. Even the arts are expected to conform to the Taylor model of productivity. Junot Diaz struggle culture art Of course we all know that's not how life works. The novel that is our life can end at any time. Sometimes even on page one. Junot Diaz pages ends sometimes Used to be in the old days, only the pulp writers wrote like machines. Now everybody is expected to be literary John Henrys. So in that context someone like me is an anomaly. Junot Diaz machines used anomalies As an artist you're on a journey of discovery and sometimes that journey takes a long time, doesn't subscribe to [a] train schedule, to the punch-clock. And I need to read a lot to make my pages happen. Junot Diaz artist journey discovery This was a perfect storm of insecurity and madness and pressure and you name it. Junot Diaz living I read a book a week, man. And I don't have a great memory, but I have a good memory about what I read. Junot Diaz memory great good man I do think that books are invaluable as a reservoir of what we call the human space. And this is why I think that, even if they're threatened, the work that they do has an incalculable merit. Junot Diaz human think space work
