Complexity is daunting, and … it can be impossible to say just what you mean. But I would rather run after the impossible than live as a string of labels: undocumented, hoodrat, Dominican, classicist. I am all of those things; no one or two of them define me.
-- The Author (Prologue)

Importance: This quote from the Prologue sums up the author's essential perspective on himself, and on his intentions in writing the book. It references the different facets of his life and identity, foreshadowing the structural, stylistic, and thematic ways in which he uses the narrative to portray the ways in which they interacted and defined his journey from insecurity to relative safety, from being closed off about himself and his identity to being more open and free.

It had been fun to learn about [Spain and the Dominican Republic]; it was even more fun to know that I knew them. But this book talked...
-- The Author (Chapter 2)