East Goes West Quotes

“You and I know that such writing—unlike the worthier phonetic systems—retards the progress of man. It should have died out long ago like Egyptian hieroglyphics. Why doesn't it die out in me? Is it because I studied only Chinese classics when I was young? Is this the reason my brain is alive with this script rooted in the history of Asia and the dim past of man? How absurd! What incredible childishness! With seventeen flying brush-strokes to make with such care that monosyllabic sound—Lung—meaning dragon! Then with what fine glow and fondness the calligrapher looks at his work! And there is no dragon, any more than an angel or devil. How can man waste his brains on such a thing?”
― Younghill Kang, East Goes West: The Making of an Oriental Yankee

“If a home has not a garden and an old tree, I see not whence the every-day joys of life are to come!”
― Younghill Kang, East Goes West: The Making of an Oriental Yankee