The Displaced Quotes

“Readers and writers should not deceive themselves that literature changes the world. Literature changes the world of readers and writers, but literature does not change the world until people get out of their chairs, go out in the world, and do something to transform the conditions of which the literature speaks.”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives

“I do not remember many things, and for all those things I do not remember, I am grateful, because the things I do remember hurt me enough.”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives

“With the exception of those born in refugee camps, every refugee used to have a life. It doesn’t matter whether you were a physician in Bosnia or a goat herder in the Congo: what matters is that a thousand little anchors once moored you to the world. Becoming a refugee means watching as those anchors are severed, one by one, until at last you’re floating outside of society, an untethered phantom in need of a new life.”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives

“These displaced persons are mostly unwanted where they fled from; unwanted where they are, in refugee camps; and unwanted where they want to go.”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives

“Becoming a refugee is a gradual process, a bleaching ou, a transition into a ghostly existence.”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives

“Readers and writers should not deceive themselves that literature changes the world. Literature changes the world of readers and writers, but literature does not change the world until people get out of their chairs, go out in the world, and do something to transform the conditions of which the literature speaks. Otherwise literature will just be a fetish for readers and writers, allowing them to think that they are hearing the voiceless when they are really only hearing the writer’s individual voice.”
― David Bezmozgis, The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives