Jhumpa Lahiri Quotes

People say to me all the time, 'When did you know that you had fully become an American?' And I say, 'The day I realized I loved peanut butter.'

Being an immigrant myself, but feeling very American, and also being the child of immigrants, I understand the feeling of wanting a home.

I couldn't be more American if I tried. I was born in Ethiopia, but I was raised and educated as an American.

Most previous immigrants came to the United States to become Americans, with no intention of returning home. They relinquished their ties with their homeland. English was their key to prosperity, and they worked hard to master it.

In general, I have felt more at home in the U.S. than I ever felt in England.

I've now been in this country for thirteen years, since I was seventeen. So this is my second home.

I was born in Peru, and we moved to Scotland when I was 15, but I've not lived here for a long time. But I would always say that I am Scottish, and Scotland is as close to a home as I have.

I was born in Australia and am proud of my Australian provenance, but I am now an American. Like so many naturalized citizens, I felt that I was an American before I formally became one.

When people ask me where I'm from, I say I'm from the Sudan. But when they ask what my hometown is, I say London. It's where I lived, and it's where my whole family lived.

I'll always be a foreigner.

I thought for a long time about leaving Albania, but at the same time to play a role in its life.

It's a complicated issue, but I define myself as an American, primarily.

It's a project that touched me as an immigrant and as a New Yorker.

I can't move back to England. My home is in France now. I'd love to but I can't. My family's all there now.

It's strange; when I was younger and people would ask, 'Where are you from?', I'd say, 'West Africa', which was odd because I'm obviously not African, but it was my home.

I can't live for more than four years outside of Canada. I'm Canadian, so ultimately that is my reference point.

We quarrel with no man for being a foreigner, but we recognize the moral right in no class of American citizens to train up their children to be foreigners, and then to claim for them all the rights, franchises, and immunities of American citizens.

We [native-born] could not choose, but they [immigrants] could and did choose to be Americans.

I am Chinese, but I am thoroughly American.

America is a land in which a man forgets his native country.

To become an American is a process which resembles a conversion. It is not so much a new country that one adopts as a new creed.

It was very hard for me, for most of my life, to feel American, or call myself American, and that is a very complicated topic that would require a very long conversation.

I almost feel like I grew up and was raised in America now, because I'm so comfortable here.

I am a permanent legal resident of this country, I was born in Korea; my parents came to America for a better life for our family, I've lived here nearly my whole life, and even though I consider myself through and through Korean and American, I guess when it comes down to it, anyone can take away my identity. It doesn't belong to me.

I'm fully English, but Portugal is my home.