Quote by Ba Jin: “Tears are not a sign of weakness, but a sign of a strong heart.”

This challenges the common misconception that showing emotion makes one weak. Instead, it argues that the ability to feel and express sadness demonstrates inner strength and a profound capacity for human experience.

In his essays, Ba Jin often explored the depths of human emotion and suffering during China's turbulent years, advocating for empathy and emotional honesty as signs of strength.

Chinese novelist and anarchist thinker of the twentieth century, best known for his semi-autobiographical trilogy Family, Spring, and Autumn, which documented the collapse of traditional Confucian family structures in modern China. Born Li Yaotang in Chengdu in 1904, he adopted the pen name Ba Jin partly as a tribute to the anarchist philosophers Bakunin and Kropotkin. He received the Magsaysay Award in 1990.