Satyajeet > Satyajeet's Quotes

“I sometimes seem to myself to wander around the world merely accumulating material for future nostalgias.”
― Vikram Seth, From Heaven Lake: Travels Through Sinkiang and Tibet

“Is it not love that knows how to make smooth things rough and rough things smooth?”
― Vikram Seth, An Equal Music

“What is the difference between my life and my love? One gets me low, the other lets me go.”
― Vikram Seth, An Equal Music

“All you who sleep tonight
Far from the ones you love,
No hand to left or right,
An emptiness above--

Know that you aren't alone.
The whole world shares your tears,
Some for two nights or one,
And some for all your years.”
― Vikram Seth

“It's not the gods
But our own hearts
We need to fear.
The evil starts
Against all odds
Not there but here.”
― Vikram Seth, Arion and the Dolphin

“Think of many things. Never place your happiness in one person's power. Be just to yourself.”
― Vikram Seth, A Suitable Boy

“Music, such music, is a sufficient gift. Why ask for happiness; why hope not to grieve? It is enough, it is to be blessed enough, to live from day to day and to hear such music-not too much, or the soul could not sustain it-from time to time.”
― Vikram Seth, An Equal Music

“In life's brief game to be a winner
A man must have...oh yes, above
All else, of course, someone to love.”
― Vikram Seth, The Golden Gate

“Man without life companion is either god or beast.”
― Vikram Seth, A Suitable Boy

“And the process of reading is such a private one. I once came into a room where a friend of mine was reading one of my books, and he clicked his tongue impatiently and shooed me off.”
― Vikram Seth, The Rivered Earth

“Good books get praised, bad books get praised. Good books get ignored, bad books get ignored”
― Vikram Seth

“In a clear brook
With joyful haste
The whimsical trout
Shot past me like an arrow

I play the line of the song, I play the leaps and plunges of the right hand of the piano, I am the trout, the angler, the brook, the observer.”
― Vikram Seth, An Equal Music

“Oh, no said her mother sadly. You know nothing of the pettiness of women. When brothers agree to split a joint family they sometimes divide lakhs of rupees worth of property in a few minutes. But the tussle of their wives over the pots and pans in the common kitchen--that nearly causes bloodshed.”
― Vikram Seth, A Suitable Boy

“Every object strives for its proper place. A book seeks to be near its truest admirer. Just as this helpless moth seeks to be near the candle that infatuates him.”
― Vikram Seth, A Suitable Boy

“He had come to a decision about the next step in his life. This decision was irrevocable unless he changed his mind.”
― Vikram Seth, A Suitable Boy

“Life is not easy for anyone here. Loss and fear, failure and disappointment, pain and ill-health, doubt and death-even those who have escaped from poverty have no escape from these. What makes life bearable is love-to love, to be loved, and-even after death or parting-to know that you have loved and been loved.”
― Vikram Seth

“you will get what you want but you must want it and not just wish it.”
― Vikram Seth, Two Lives

“To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never to forget.”
― Arundhati Roy, The Cost of Living

“That's what careless words do. They make people love you a little less.”
― Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

“And the air was full of Thoughts and Things to Say. But at times like these, only the Small Things are ever said. Big Things lurk unsaid inside.”
― Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

“If you're happy in a dream, does that count?”
― Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

“Change is one thing. Acceptance is another.”
― Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

“This was the trouble with families. Like invidious doctors, they knew just where it hurt.”
― Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

“She wore flowers in her hair and carried magic secrets in her eyes. She spoke to no one. She spent hours on the riverbank. She smoked cigarettes and had midnight swims...”
― Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

“When you hurt people, they begin to love you less. That's what careless words do. They make people love you a little less.”
― Arundhati Roy

“Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.”
― Arundhati Roy

“I am completely a loner. In my head I want to feel I can be anywhere. There is a sort of recklessness that being a loner allows me.”
― Arundhati Roy

“The American way of life is not sustainable. It doesn’t acknowledge that there is a world beyond America. ”
― Arundhati Roy

“Things can change in a day.”
― Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

“Some things come with their own punishments.”
― Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things