In the United States, the immigrant experience occupies a very central place in American mythology. And sometimes, that place wavers between acceptance and rejection.

Every new refugee to a society, whether it's the United States or some other place, is subjected to fear. They are the new outsider population, the new other.

Immigrants, as troubling as they are to some people, are an integral part of what the American Dream is supposed to be. They're understandable to a considerable number of Americans.

People might like to think a war is done when a cease fire is signed, but for most people who lived through a war it goes on for decades.

Writers from the majority can assume their audiences know what they're talking about - they don't have to explain things, whereas minority writers are expected to.

My identity is deeply intertwined with being a refugee because that's the first experience that I remember.

I never called myself a writer because it seemed so pretentious - a writer was what somebody else called you, a title bestowed.

I've never stopped being a refugee.

Hollywood in many ways serves as the unofficial ministry of propaganda for the United States.

If you're a so-called minority writer, the temptation is to write for the majority... I refuse to do that.

No one wants for their child to become a refugee. It's an awful experience.

There are enough blessings for everyone. You need to reach out for yours.

It feels nice to emerge from the lies.

I'm the most insecure guy in Hollywood. If you had it good all your life, you figure it can't ever get bad, but when you had it bad, you wonder how long a thing like this will last

I have always known that at last I would take this road, but yesterday I did not know that it would be today.

Are the people who run for president really the best in a country of 240 million? If so, something has happened to the gene pool.

Criticism is the windows and chandeliers of art: it illuminates the enveloping darkness in which art might otherwise rest only vaguely discernible, and perhaps altogether unseen.

We can only penetrate the rind of the earth.

why is the word 'qualified' applied only to those who have to be more so?

So he's like a human compass? As far as superpowers go, that's pretty lame. You're like the Caster equivalent of Aquaman.

The difficulty of tactical maneuvering consists in turning the devious into the direct, and misfortune into gain.